![\"FullSizeRender\"](\"http:\/\/improvingourworld.winonastateu.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/28\/2015\/08\/FullSizeRender.jpg\")
<\/a>Here’s my rough sketch of what my armor will look like. Pretty bad-ass, right?!<\/p><\/div>\n
I\u2019d like my suit of armor to have a lot of English influence, both in history and design, as well as some aspects from other western European countries, such as Germany. For example, in my initial concept, I\u2019ll be using the great helm as my helmet. It\u2019s relatively easy to make, it\u2019s a classic helm from the 13th<\/sup> century and early into the 14th<\/sup> (soon replaced by the bascinet), and my personal favorite! So many designs have adapted it, whether it be real history or fiction. Though it excelled in protection, it suffered in peripheral vision and ventilation, the helm overheated the user if the model in question wasn\u2019t vented adequately. Cosmetically, the helm can end up a bit large if made improperly (Though sometimes a larger helm is preferred). So, if mine turns out ridiculously large, I may switch to a sallet instead. The sallet is significantly more English, but not quite as cool as the great helm (for lack of a better word!). The rest of the costume will not feature a lot of metal, as making it would be quite difficult on a time crunch (I\u2019m giving myself about a week). I\u2019ll be using a lot of cloth and leather, with \u201cmetal\u201d armor only on the hands, elbows, shoulders, head and knees.<\/p>\n Now, metalworking is far from easy. It requires a lot, such as a forge and actual metal (obviously). I have none of this, so making my armor out of metal is pretty much out of the question. Excluding the gauntlets, chainmail coif and replica sword, my armor pieces will be fiberglass! The chainmail isn\u2019t really tough metalworking, you don\u2019t even need a forge. One can just coil wire around a pen or pencil, cut it into rings, and then attach the rings according to a chainmail pattern. It\u2019s a tedious process, but I\u2019ll only be making a hood. Fiber glassing is even easier (if done properly). Using patterns of armor intended for metalworking, I\u2019ll print them onto cardstock paper. This way I\u2019ve got a durable base material, regular paper would crumple once fiberglass resin was painted over it. From there, I\u2019ll cut out the patterns, folding and gluing accordingly, almost like a puzzle (with only a few pieces). From here I\u2019ll have my paper model!<\/p>\n At this point, I\u2019ll be able to assess my progress. If the piece of armor is too big or too small, doesn\u2019t fit, or just isn\u2019t what I wanted, I can scrap it and make a new one without wasting fiberglass. Once I\u2019m happy with my model, I\u2019ll coat the cardstock paper model in fiberglass resin at every angle, placing the fiberglass cloth on only the inside of the armor, so it doesn\u2019t show, but the structural integrity is maintained. Once dried, I\u2019ll sand and bondo (a type of putty used for exterior auto repairs that dries rock hard and can be sanded and painted) the now fiberglass model until it\u2019s smoothed in all the right spots, and rough and tough in the rest. (Have to keep it looking super heavy metal and manly, of course!) Now comes the painting, which might be a bit tricky, as I\u2019ll have to find the right kind of metallic paint and weather it according to the metal parts of the costume so they match. Next is padding, detailing, and making the according straps (likely out of elastic and faux leather, the latter for authenticity).<\/p>\n Last from not least come the non-metal\/fiberglass parts, I\u2019ll fashion a basic forest green tunic out of heavy cloth, a black undershirt and leggings from hide-like materials, a belt and leg padding of faux leather, and get heavy leather boots which I\u2019ll adapt slightly to fit the medieval vibe. I\u2019ll grab a rough and tattered looking scarf to match my tunic and give the get-up a grizzlier vibe and weather the whole suit a bit to make it look worn from intense combat (likely with scoundrels, dragons and snails). After some more detailing and whatnot, I may craft a coat of arms from basic materials to sow onto the chest, giving my knight a symbol to stand for! Finally, I\u2019ll make myself a harness to keep the sheath (which I may also adapt) firmly on my back. A historically inaccurate detail that I\u2019m including only because I like the look of it so much!<\/p>\n If all goes as planned, I\u2019ll have my suit complete by late august when the Fall 2015 semester starts up, and it\u2019ll be ready to go for all my snail-fighting and dragon-slaying adventures! TO BATTLE!<\/p>\n –Mitch Stanke<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Since setting my mind on making armor, the focus of my project here in London, I\u2019ve wanted to design my own suit\/costume around my observations of English armor. Perhaps I would design my suit for a knight character. I wasn\u2019t sure I\u2019d actually use the design, so my goal shifted. From there, it dawned on […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":67,"featured_media":1657,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":true,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[162],"tags":[166],"class_list":["post-453","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-travel","tag-london-2015"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pb2ffS-7j","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.winona.edu\/academics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/453","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.winona.edu\/academics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.winona.edu\/academics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.winona.edu\/academics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/67"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.winona.edu\/academics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=453"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.winona.edu\/academics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/453\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1873,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.winona.edu\/academics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/453\/revisions\/1873"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.winona.edu\/academics\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.winona.edu\/academics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=453"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.winona.edu\/academics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=453"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.winona.edu\/academics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=453"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}