Éowyn's Dernhelm Armor
10.25.04
After having this costume planned for a long time, I finally started on it. About a week ago, I purchased some green quilted fabric to make the gambeson (under tunic). I don't think the original had quilted fabric, but it's the standard for wearing under chain maille for re-enactment groups. Today, I made the under tunic. I decided to order my wire (16 gauge galvy) from The Ring Lord. The prices there are pretty reasonable. I also started researching ways to dye the leather once I get it.
11.1.04
A few days ago, I ordered my wire for the chain maille. Twenty nine pounds of 16 gauge wire from The Ring Lord. I was going to get a round 30 pounds, but at that number the shipping price almost tripled the price of the wire. I've also been researching about dying and tooling the leather - RIT dye? I've heard it works. I'll experiment later.
11.9.04
My wire arrived today!
I've started coiling the wire and cutting rings to make the maille.
11.11.04
I'm not going to go into the complete steps of making the maille - there are enough websites out there for that purpose. If you're interested, Maille Artisans has some good articles. I'm using a European 4 in 1 weave. Perhaps I should go easy on myself to begin with. It's been a while since I made chain maille, and my hands have gotten really raw really quickly. Last night my fingers just started randomly bleeding while I was holding a pair of pliers. It's quite creepy to look down and see your fingers covered in blood for no apparent reason.
12.28.04
Continuing to work on my chain maille :). While posting on the Windmill MR forum, one of the posters said something interesting about the techiniques for embellishing the armor:
"And Dernhelms armour.. I know the bloke what made her Helm;) I got to see the concept sketch before RotK came out;) ANd handle some of the trial pieces. The horses on the cheeks are "stamped." Actually, the way many things were "stamped" was to make a resin stamp and put the leather and the stamp in a vice."
Interesting...
1.22.05
Not much going on...I'm continuing to work on my chaine maille.
3.26.05
While I'm continuing to work on my chain maille, I made this list of leather resources. I'm going to order my leather at (probably the beginning of May.
Leather Unlimited: I'm going to get an 8/9 oz. oak tanned shoulder, size small. The smallest size they have is 10-12 square feet, which I think will be more than enough for the vest and a set of vambraces. Imagine that, the vegetarian goes hardcore with leather instead of something easier (and cheaper!) like fun foam. I'll probably also get my buckles and a celtic knotwork stamp from this place, because I'm definatly not tooling all that knotwork that goes down the front.
Art Sparx Gilding Supplies: For (guess what!) gilding supplies! I'm going to get the 'Basic Gilding Kit.' It looks pretty good for a set of beginner supplies.
Huff's Leather Crafts: All my tooling supplies (stylus, knife, bevelers) will come from here. They also have a pretty good supply of leather dye for fairly cheap, so I might get some of that. I read somewhere (probably ACS) that some people have used RIT dye for leather. This seems kind of an unreliable way to dye leather, but I don't know that much about it. It's probably safter just to go with a real leather dye and finish. I need dark brown, dark red, and dark green.
