How To Build A Leather Armour From Scratch || For LARP And Other Costumes

in a previous video I showed you guys how  to make a leather armour pattern completely   from scratch and now that we've got our  pattern we can actually start crafting it   for that I have actually bought some really cool  leather it's a b quality leather which means   that it has all sorts of marks and blemishes on it  normally you would want pristine leather but for   this considering my character is a survivalist and  the fighter I figured B quality would be really   cool and I can't wait to show you guys so without  further ado let's get crafting to start we can   trace the pieces onto the leather with an awl and  while doing this also add one centimetre allowance   on each seam that will end up under another piece  as I forgot to add this to the paper pattern   I cut the pieces then put them back on the leather  mirrored for the other half after this I also cut   both pieces for the back and the front piece then  all the edges that will stay visible are bevelled   with the exception of the middle back seam and the  front darts I also bevelled the edges of the wrong   side this isn't fully necessary but it gets rid of  some of the fluff and makes the burnishing later   on even smoother because for the next step we are  going to groove the stitching lines for this I set   my stitch groover to four millimetres and groove  the line on the places where stitching is going to   be this is done only for the pieces that will lay  on top for the back and the front I grooved all   around the pieces but that is a decoration  decision as you will see in the next part   I want to keep the decoration simple the idea  is that this armour is purely practical and   there isn't much need or time to add decorations  but I also really want to try out this rolling   wheel for the first time so the stitch lines  I grooved earlier are guidance lines to follow   with the roller I rolled this all around the front  and the back applying quite a bit of pressure and   rolling slightly forwards and backwards so  the wheel passes the same bit more than once   and well this is what the end result of the wheel  looks like it's a different way of working for me   usually I only fully carve and stamp everything  and I must say this does go quite a lot quicker   it is a bit of getting used to you need to apply  quite a bit of pressure and really really make   sure that you go over each part two or three  times by moving the wheel forward and backwards   but all in all I'm quite happy with it I am really  curious though how it will hold up after I dyed it   if it's still going to be as visible as it is now  but before I can actually start dyeing there's one   thing that's really useful to do first and  that's to actually cut the straps so I can   dye them along with the rest for this short  armour I'm going to make one strap over the   shoulders as you can see these are quite small  so I don't really have much more space than one   strap and on the sides I think I'm going to do  two straps I think that will look quite pretty   so that means one two three four five six straps  in total for the length of the straps I remember   when I did a test fit on the shoulders there was  a gap here but it wasn't too big so I think if I   have the strap overlap three centimetres on this  side I think a strap of eight or nine centimetres   here should be more than plenty which means that  after this I'll have to measure the length of   the side straps and then we can get to cutting  them it turned out the side gaps were about two   centimetres so including overlap I made all straps  nine centimetres long for the width I realized a   problem I hadn't ordered any buckles yet so I  didn't know the exact width but after a quick   web shop spree the buckles were ordered they are  listed as having 16.5 millimetre inner width so   the straps can be one and a half centimetre wide  I do want the straps to be slightly decorative   so I made a template and used this to cut the  straps after the first two straps I made a small   change of plan as the straps did look slightly  short for the sides so I made another template   that was two centimetres longer and used this  to cut out the side straps to my big surprise a package with buckles came in~ this means I could finally  also make a template for the buckles and cut   these as well after cutting the leather all the  edges were bevelled to make them look even nicer before I dye everything I want to punch the holes  that the buckle bit goes through for that I've   made a mark on my template but I don't know if  this one and a half centimetre is too much or   not enough to have this buckle part go through  so I made a small mock-up template and with this   we can check if my measurements are actually  correct if this is enough or too much to have   the buckle bit go through the idea is that when  you have this hole it is slightly bigger than   the width of the buckle part itself because if  it would be super tight you can't actually open   up the buckle all the way so you want it to be  slightly bigger to make sure that the buckle can   easily move up and down well it seems that that  is the case here so it's definitely not too small   and I think it can actually be slightly smaller  considering I've got a gap of about would it be   three millimetre here then again the leather will  also add extra thickness so you know what I think   I'm just going to keep it this one and a half  centimetre I can now use this template to make   markings on every part where the buckle attaches  I'm not yet going to punch all of the holes that   for the strap parts that go through here I'm  only going to do that after I'm done dyeing   after marking the holes with an awl we can grab  a proper hole punch and punch all the holes on   the straps now we make it complete by cutting  between these holes so we get an elongated slit next step is to dye everything and for that  we first have to decide which colour of dye   we want to use I've got this brown this brown  and this red brown here and well of course this   is already the colour that we were already using  for the costume and I do like it a lot however I   think with the tooling that we've rolled into  the armour this dark brown is going to be too   dark to properly see the tooling so I quite like  that colour however I do not have a lot of this   left and I'm not sure if that's enough but the  characters that we're playing are scavengers   and the idea is well they make everything with  whatever they can find so I'm not thinking how   about if I actually start with this colour and if  I run out I can always continue with that colour   you know what let's do that again I use a  piece of an old t-shirt to rub the dye in   circles on the leather I find this gives  a nice coverage after rubbing it in a bit   and this is the moment the B quality leather  starts to shine the rougher uneven surface with   marks is exactly the look I was going for  it really fits the rough living scavenger   for some reason I keep forgetting that this method  does not fill in the carvings and indentations and   again I really like it so I'm just going to keep  it this way it also fits nicely with the quiver   after the Torso pieces I also dyed all the straps  I am lightly rubbing the sides of these but   otherwise I am keeping all the sides relatively  neutral it fits with the dyeless carvings   I do find one layer a tad bit light and too  reddish which is easily solved by adding another   layer this gives the dye a nicer bit of depth  after letting it dry overnight it is time to punch   the holes in the straps to line them all up I  used an awl and the template to mark a small point   and then place the whole point over it in such a  way that the point is in the centre of the punch   whack it with a hammer a few  times and you got your holes then it is time to punch more holes this time for  the stitch lines these are punched along all the   stitch grooves we marked earlier and this time  also along the two darts in the front panel I   found the strap ends a bit small to also draw the  stitch grooves so I used an edge creaser to mark   where the stitches should end up and found out  my forks can still be used to mark the placement   of the holes that's quite lucky as that saves me  having to measure each stitch hole I do not whack   the forks here as that would also leave marks  on the sides of the straps and we do not want   that instead I will use my awl to punch each hole  individually in the moment I will stitch them on   after that it is time to burnish for  this I applied some tokonole and vigorously   rubbed it with a burnisher we do this for all the  edges that will be visible so basically the same   edges that we bevelled earlier and yes that also  means all of these strap edges I also burnished   the backs of the straps this makes them smoother  less likely to catch on clothing and I just like   the feeling of it when using them doing this  completely took me no less than three full hours   next is applying some resolene this makes it less  likely to bleed the dye and gives it a nice sheen   the sheen isn't necessary for this armour but  anyway I also find it makes the leather look   even tougher the big bits I did with a sponge  after which I went over the tooling and indents   with a brush I also did the straps with the brush  as the sponge would have just made a mess out of   it I must say that was a very productive day  today considering that when I started this   morning my first step was to punch the holes in  these straps but we kind of have to considering   my event is in two weeks and I have some very busy  weeks up ahead with not a lot of time of crafting   but we're actually at a stage where we can  finally start to put all of this together   and I must say I'm really curious how that's going  to turn out because I'm already super happy with   this still most happy with the fact that I went  with B quality leather because this is exactly   what we needed all these marks and scratches it's  just perfect for this kind of armour but anyway   enough talking time to continue crafting for the  mammoth task of sewing we start with the smaller   bits so the side panels first draw a groove with  the stitch groover on the piece that will lay on   top on a centimetre from the edge this is so  we can easily line up the other piece on the   back side without visible markings on the front  then we punch the first two holes with a sharp awl  after which we can widen in the hole with the  blunt awl then the needle can be poked through   and after making sure both sides have the same  length we can start stitching with a saddle stitch   I like to do the first two stitches flat on  the table and after that it gets inserted   into the stitching pony or with curved seams  just in my hand with the eight of some clips of course this also gets repeated for the  other side after finishing both sides we   can start stitching in the darts on the front  because I'm working with a contrasting thread   I do want to make sure it stands out in this case  I think cross stitches are prettier than straight   stitches and to make it easier for ourselves start  at the inside and work towards the outside so you   can pull the darts tighter with each stitch  having repeating elements always works nice   so the two back parts also get stitched together  with the crossed stitches the further I get with   this stitching the more I dig it the type of  stitching and the thread colour really work well   with the dye and the undyed parts so I started  sewing in the side panels and now I realize I   need to do something that I usually don't really  do it's really annoying to hold these side panels   in shape and also use the awl to properly punch  all the holes on this side especially now that   we're getting furthering and my thumb and fingers  can't actually reach it so usually I just put the   two pieces of leather on top of each other and  start sewing but this time I actually have to   glue them and for this we can grab contact cement  which I can apply on the edge I have to make sure   I'm not going in too far because I only got a  centimetre or so I can then spread this out a bit the idea of contact cement is that you put  it on both sides let it dry and once it is   dry and as the name implies of contact cement  once the two layers of glue come into contact   with each other it will stick immediately and  it's a really good stick and then we can glue   them together for this we also need to make sure  that we immediately glue the right depth of the   side panel to the front because once this is  together we won't be able to move it anymore something like this now I  need to hold it for a bit   and then we should be able to just let  it go and then we can sew all through it   after the glue has dried we can continue  stitching in the side panels this really   makes it come together and it actually starts  looking like the final thing when the body is   done we can attach the buckles but before we  do this we can sew in the buckles themselves   as it is only three stitches I stitched the same  bit twice we can repeat this for all six buckles   then we can attach them to the body the exact  placement was a bit of a guesstimate but for   the part with the buckles I made the end of the  leather part of the buckle strap line up with   the edge of the leather panel it was attached to  after that it can be stitched all the way around before we get on the buckles  on the side on the back   we have to determine the placement and well  considering the front has two panels here   I think it's the nicest if either buckle ends  up at the middle piece of that pattern which   will end up looking somewhat like this and I  think that will be really pretty so what I'll   have to do is measure these distances and make  sure that this buckle ends up in the middle and   that this buckle ends up in the middle so let's  do the measuring and then we can sew these on   after the buckles it is time for the straps and  again we start with the shoulder ones because once   these are attached we know how high the side seams  will be and we can match that up easier as we said   before I'm going to use the shorter straps for the  shoulders and the longer straps for the sides so   for the placement of the shoulder straps I have  thought of a distance of two centimetres here and   the idea with straps like this is that it is the  middle hole that's on the buckle when it is on the   intended width so I can just grab this and place  this roughly on where the middle hole would be   now of course I have to duplicate the placing of  this strap on the other side so for that I'm going   to measure what's going to be a nice distance  to use what I see is that the distance from the   middle bit so where it's the widest is a nice two  and a half centimetres from the edge I think I'm   going to use this so I can line this up two and a  half there we go and then I also have to make sure   that it's somewhat in the middle so that means  that this is the placement that we're going to use and now that we've punched our first hole we can  just repeat the steps that we did previously so I   just did a test fit by attaching the shoulders  together and putting it on and then holding the   sides closed with my hands and then just as I  was already thinking I realized that I can't   put these straps in the middle hole because  then this gap will still be too big so the   straps actually need to be two holes smaller than  that so on the one smallest hole and that's the   thing with these adjustable straps I mean it's  adjustable so this isn't that big of a problem   but anyway about attaching I think I'm going to  attach them at this distance from the edge and   that means that the stitching line across will be  about half a centimetre from the edge and as for   the height well I mean there is some slack in the  straps so I think I can just put both of these in   the middle of these pieces now let's see if I can  mark this hole without punching through the table   it's probably difficult to see on camera but there  is a dent in here and dent in here I can at least   see them very well now we replicate these marks  for the other side and then stitch all four straps   on just like we did for all of the other straps  and these four straps are the last of the in total   12 straps that needed to be attached to this  armour which means that after this we are done   the armour is finished I really like the way it  fits the patterning at the beginning was a bit of   a hassle but fully worth the result I think that  this armour will be one I can have a lot of use   of it is relatively neutral and very functional  as it doesn't restrict any movement the simple   design and decoration combined with the ruggedness  of the B quality leather gives an armour that fits   nearly any character I play which doesn't mean I  won't find an excuse to still make new armours for   every individual character and with that thank  you all for watching and see you guys next time

Channel: MarisArmoury

Views: 11,507

Keywords: marisarmoury, leather armour, larp costume, larp armour, how to make leather armor, leather armor, how to build leather armour, leather torso armour, armour, armor, how to stitch leather, how to tool leather, how to work with leather, leather larp armor, larp diy, how to make a larp costume, larp crafting, leather costume armor, leather rolling wheel, cosplay armor, leather cosplay armor, leather armor tutorial, leather breastplate, female leather armor, fantasy armor, larp

Id: 30PFbZZymYw

Length: 17min 36sec (1056 seconds)

Published: Thu Nov 03 2022