Our Capabilites in
Armouring
If you are
considering commissioning us to make something for you, we're sure you
would probably like to know something about what we are
capable of, and in addition, the sorts of commissions we are willing to
take on.
Style and Substance:
We focus primarily upon the historically plausible. We are
not your average SCA-type armourers, and you will rarely find us putting
conventional bargrilles on ANY of our helmets. Any barwork that is
present will be minimalized and integrated into the work as much as
possible. Likewise, we try very
hard not to make use of other armourers' patterns or work for our
inspiration; the vast majority of our pieces are based on images and
actual handling of extant originals in museums, collections, and so on.
This is not to say that we would never take on a fantasy project, or
something of mixed time-periods based on a sketch or drawing. Just that
it would have to look "right" to us before we tried making some strange
kludge that would never work as well as an extant piece could have.
As far as materials are concerned, we mostly try to stick to the
tried-and-true leather and steel. Aidan does do some work in Aluminum
from time to time (usually in hidden or covered pieces like coats-of-plates), but the dreaded "plas-tick" is right out as an
armouring material. We just don't do it. Stainless steel is another
no-go, unfortunately; we tried it once, but it just isn't worth the
sheer amount of effort and wear & tear on tools required to do it
right.
Pricewise, we try to make our armour as affordable as possible. To
accomplish this in the modern world is no mean feat; as such, we will
very rarely polish our work to a mirror finish (we have the technology,
but we'd have to charge much higher prices as polishing takes up so
damn much time), and the occasional hammermark will show up on most of
our final pieces. This puts us in what would historically be called the
"rough-from-the-hammer" category of armouring, which by the way is NOT
the same thing as "unfinished". All of our pieces are planished and
ground to a basic wire-wheel finish. We believe this gives our work a
character which a perfect mirror polish lacks... something that your
average medieval combatant would consider practical, hardworking armour.
All of this does, of course, come with a caveat: All of us are doing
this as a hobby, mostly because we enjoy it. Because of this, our turnaround times can be a
little long sometimes. On the other hand, you are getting armourers who
really enjoy what they do, and will work pretty darn hard to make what
you ask of us.
A note on pricing:
None of our past work pictures have prices associated with them - we
believe in tailoring the price of custom work to the actual nature of
the work being done. In general though, one could estimate these very
rough prices, dependant on materials used, decoration, and design:
$40-$100: non-articulated armour parts (knees, elbows, unshaped
greaves, shoulder cops).
$100-$250: articulated knees or elbows (more lames would obviously
increase the final price). Simple breastplates.
$250-$600: a full leg or arm harness, breastplates, helmet or gauntlets.
$600-$1000: highly decorated pieces of armour, made as historically
accurately as we can manage.
over $1000: whatever you can dream of. Full suits, complex custom work
with insane decorative components, etc.