My old home town (where I grew up) just had its second annual Renaissance Faire. I would love for it to grow and become a larger event, so I want to support it and participate in it. This is what I wore for a couple hours around the faire:
The Old Adventurer
I’m deciding which color gambeson to wear under my black brigandine for my Mercenary kit. Blue is my favorite color, but the red, I think, looks better in this concept. Without the helmet on, the red is much better for my complexion. The blue makes my face look sickly, the red makes my skin look more alive.
Looking at the two colors side by side, in character, I’m thinking I’ll go with the red for the Mercenary, and keep the blue for the Knight.
The OId Adventurer
I’m working on a new character kit: The Mercenary.
I’m basing this kit on my brigandine armor, with some plate pieces. Here is the set and color scheme I’m working on:
The Old Adventurer
This is something I’ve been anticipating with excitement: a brigandine cuirass. I ordered it back in May 2021, and it just arrived to me in January 2022. I ordered it from Steel Mastery. They have a long wait list (3-4 months) just to start on it, but this is the first piece of armor I’ve bought that was actually crafted to my personal measurements.
Steel Mastery has good customer service. They answer emails quickly, and are friendly and informative. They made me comfortable laying out a few hundred dollars for something I won’t see for several months.
If you don’t know, a brigandine is steel plate armor (it’s not “studded leather”). The interior is many metal plates (about the size of a credit card) riveted to the outer wool. This is the interior (Steel Mastery sent me this photo of them working on it):
It weights 15 pounds, and it fits snugly and comfortably. It’s tailored so I can wear it over a thick gambeson or with only thin clothes. It feels good. It is flexible to some extent (more flexible than a solid plate cuirass of the same size), but I can’t bend over and touch the floor; I can bend forward about 90 degrees.
I’m testing and thinking about how I want to wear this — over a gambeson, over mail, over gambeson and mail, or just over clothes. I’m not sure yet, but I do have some plate pieces to wear with it (shoulders and greaves).
An interesting note: It’s noisy when not on my body — it jingles. But when worn, it’s quiet and secure.
The Old Adventurer