Tuesday 22 June 2010

Prototype: The Thief's Gambeson

The Thief's Gambeson went through many names and in the end, came back to being known as what it is now. It is a cotton-padded  garment, made from brown faux suede. It is lined and edged in a dark brown linen. The straps are made from the same linen. All the trappings are made of a brass-coloured metal alloy.

The Gambeson features belt loops, pouches and a tool-roll (detailed photos of the roll under the cut). The left sleeve is detachable and the right vambrace has on it two dagger loops. It also has two very basic weaponsloops at the back (suitable for weapons up to 36" in length. A 42" is a little too long to draw easily.)

The sketch first made its appearance on the blog in February and to be honest, the name "chicken wrapped in bacon" is still used above any other when not trying to sell it someone.

In aesthetic, the Designer and I like to think of it as classic "dungeonpunk", a term that I believe Dungeons and Dragons coined for themselves when describing their style in the days of early 3.0. I still think of the great Buckle Mage as the iconic and archetypal iteration of this style with his excessive belting, but I do believe many of the better informed denizens of geekdom would question this statement.

Dungeonpunk, of course, has gained meaning as a setting descriptor. The curious reader may go lose themselves in the wonderful tvtropes for further illumination on the topic.

The sleeve is attached by only a short ribbon in the photos. Ideally, it should be laced on with thonging, but we forgot some the day of the photoshoot and had to use Gracewing's hair ribbon.

That all said, the nice man who bought it off me at Nerd East said he was going to play a surgeon in it. So perhaps all this talk of dungeonpunk and thieves and scouts is all moot. Equally, I was told that the design was very anime and evoked images of the Final Fantasy games (which apparently also shares this costume's affinity to asymmetry).

To commission a similarly fiddly gambeson from the Costume Mercenary would cost in the region of £160.

The gambeson is worn under a white and brown version of the Steampunk Shirt, to be available via Character Kit shortly.

More photos under the cut.




The tool-roll, open. It is based on the Designer's roll in which he kept his dissection kit.

The tool-roll, buckled shut.

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