Sexy armour

Once in a while its just fun to try something different. So I asked Mr. Clyde Caldwell if I could make armour, based on his popular paintings. He said okay, so I am making some nice sexy armour.
This fantasy armour follows all the rules of fantasy illustration...the arrows only hit the shiny spots, a well turned ankle in high heels doesn't result in a badly turned ankle on the battlefield, swords are absurdly huge, perhaps because they are driven by magic, and the women who wear them all have more attitude than is strictly good for those around them.

Attitude. Thats a good thing right? Oh, and the disclaimer...this armour is most assuredly NOT SCA legal. Heck, it might be illegal in MOST jurisdictions....grin!

The whole story about making this armour is on my armouring blog http://southtowerarmouringguild.blogspot.com/ and after a day's puzzling, measuring, hammering, and wheeling, I came up with these. They have yet to be trimmed, and the wheel marks are still showing on the surface, but I am sorta okay with them. I am using this picture as a wallpaper on my computer....I like the composition, accidental as it might be. click on it to enlarge. illustration used by permission from clyde caldwell, copyright 2009.
www.clydecaldwell.com

Wicked

This is Andrea. She made that vambrace in my shop. Four whale tails. Oh my.

click on the image to enlarge this wallpaper.


Wicked eh?

The holidays slowed me down a bit....but I made the above armour anyway. The whole story is on my armouring blog...http://southtowerarmouringguild.blogspot.com

ttfn

Prague Armour

Because I am too hot and tired to actually MAKE any armour lately, and rather than post any of my own extensive collection of armour pictures, I decided to post some of Pierre's. I have been posting fairly extensively on my "armouring" blog....a blog in which I discuss armour, show off my work, and my student's work, and talk about the details which separate one armour from another. Needless to say, opinions are my own.

The above pic is of a landsknecht leiderhosen. I betcha it is NOT period to the late 1600's....the idea of fabric lasting this long, and certainly leather would not! But, it is a really neat costume piece, and I figure the seamstresses and tailors who follow my blog might find it more than a little interesting.

Click to enlarge, and visit my armouring blog. http://southtowerarmouringguild.blogspot.com/

Regards.

Spaulders

I made these last week. They will be pictured on my armour blog http://southtowerarmouringguild.blogspot.com/ but I had to show them off here. I lost count of the hours since it was a week of getting interrupted!

Shoulder armour

I have been pretty busy this week, designing and building this shoulder armour. The whole story is on my armour web site.... http://www.southtowerarmouringguild.blogspot.com/

Suffice it to say, it was probably the most difficult and complex armour I have ever made.

World of armour

This is an armour I made for Mr. Merino, well, most of it. It is interesting enough to go the trouble of discussing it on my armour site....http://southtowerarmouringguild.blogspot.com. This armour is a little different in that there is a minimum of front straps, its all sliding rivets and concealed straps in back. The rest is reasonably straightforward though. (Hey, its what I bin doin!)

Todays' post is...

Today's post is on my armouring blog.... please visit it.

http://southtowerarmouringguild.blogspot.com/

shoulder armour

moved to the South Tower Armouring Guild blog
http://southtowerarmouringguild.blogspot.com

Dave's Armour

Mr Big and Tall armour makers at your service!

Dave is six foot ten, and wants to be married in a suit of armour. This is what I made for him. Here I am, adjusting his front strap.
The faulds have been trimmed away since this picture was taken, and the tassets seem to look a little less like an afterthought. Thats his princess in the picture above!
I think it is too high up under his arms, but the trooper that he is, he figures it is just fine. Good thing too since it is NOT an easy fix! It does fit a bit better when the straps are all tightened in back...which they are not in this pic. Failure to tighten up the straps results in gaps in front. You can see his red shirt in those gaps. They closed up just fine after I pulled it in a notch or two in back.
http://southtowerarmouringguild.blogspot.com/

The rest of this post has been moved to

Medieval Stuff

click on the images to enlarge.

One of the things I do is research my trade as much as possible. There are so many people who think that just because they can do a little body work that they can make a suit of armour. Okay, I was one of those people. However, going to the trouble of actually measuring the real suits of armour goes a long way to providing the credibility that you need if you want to call yourself a "professional". The top picture is of me demonstrating real techniques I have picked up from medieval books. Doing live steel fighting in full armour, in this case, chain mail armour, is very illuminating! I am certain that without actually getting into real armour, you cannot really know what it is like to actually fight in it. How does your body move, how does the weight drag down arm, what can't you do in armour that you would have no diffiulty doing in street clothes.

Similarly, to measure the real armours in a real armury is so worth while doing! The bottom four pictures are of my "direct measurement" session in the Palace Museum in Malta in 2005. Just as you should not fight without learning how they did it in the "old days", you should not make armour without at least holding a couple of real pieces of armour in your hands and absorbing as much as you can during the inevitable short session. Not like I can make a psychic connection with the armourer from 1675, but rather, to know that what one man made once can be made by another man now.

I learned how big the hammers were that he used to dish that metal out. I learned how he scrubbed all the hammer marks off the face of the armour with abrasive bricks which left deep scratches that not even subsequent passes with grit could totally remove. I learned that the guy who made the armour is very unlikely to be the one who decorated it. And I learned where the armourer put his leather straps to allow the armour to hang properly. And I learned that it is not a one person job; that somebody has to hold the chisel!

So looking forward to another trip sometime in May.