The Prospect of a Horse

I've been discussing doing some photos on horseback with an ex-housemate of mine. She knows (among many other horse-related things) how to ride sidesaddle and we've been talking about getting the Gothic Coat out for arranging over the rump of a horse.

(Incidentally, these photos of the Gothic Coat constantly tempt me to play about with them on photoshop and there is a great and very pretentious desire in me to caption them with quotes like I am half sick of shadows in an overly swirly font. And yes, the photo the the left is indeed photoshoped. To death and back.)

The Original Elven Coat

This was the original Elven Coat, designed and tailored to fit a woman, made in black faux suede and black linen. It's heavily inspired by Arwen's battle costume which never made it into the Lord of the Rings film, but that said, it also differs quite significantly, not simply in colour and material choice.

The photos are taken by the modern art structure by Prebends Bridge. It's called Reveal, and is done by Richard Cole. The stone is from the cathedral pinnacle, "recycled" here as art. Cole has various things to say about, but to me, it's awesomeness lies in the fact that it looks to me to be the visible tip of a great buried citadel, that has been buried there. It reminds me of the ancient lost and sunken cities, it hints at a whole, well, cathedral, just under our feet. Hence my associating it with elves, the ever fading and waning race.

That said, the Designer told me that he sees no such resonances in Reveal and that it's just me.

What do you see?

(These photos were taken when I was really quite under the weather. Forgive the haggard appearance and try to think of it as the eons catching up with an aged elf or something. Or just berate me in the comments.)

Various Sketches of Dresses

I've been playing watercolours again (several boxes are all sprawled across the dining room table in a sort of artistic chaos) and here are some of the results.

The sketch to the left is partly for Loretta (who was behind most of the Hong Kong photography), since she'd been toying with idea of a gown along those lines for a while. The intention, if I recall correctly, was to use a cotton print sheeting for the outer dress (she had her eye on a cream with red roses much like that pictured) and probably a pale coloured muslin for the underdress.

The Designer suggested the buttons on the zone front dress to the left. I'm still not entirely sure about it, but the concept is growing on me. There isn't much to say about it beyond it'd probably look good in a rough silk, and that it's reasonably Georgian and I'm quite fond of it.

These sketches are done in watercolours, then inked with a 0.5 gel pen (nearest black pen I had lying around). They're done on 110gsm paper, which accounts for the shadows in the background - the paper is thick enough to withstand being swamped by watercolours, but it does wibble it somewhat.

I feel the urge to apologise for my use of fashion templates. It almost feels like cheating. They're not remotely proportioned like actual human beings (even models, for that mater), but I've gotten to the point of thinking of it as concept art. These sketches are to real clothing, what concept art in video games are to the actual level design.

On the Set of Harry Potter

That wall behind me, is not a real wall. It is not made of real stone.

And it isn't just any fake wall.

It was part of the Harry Potter set, as a corridor in the great Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. The wall hides a dry riser inlet that needed to be masked for the shooting of the film. Due to it looking really quite good, the fake wall was kept and it is a piece of the purpose-built set still standing, to this day, in Durham Cathedral. You too can experience the thrills of knocking on it and hearing the hollow sound.

More information about Durham Cathedral's appearance in the early Harry Potter films at the HP Lexicon.

The coat being worn in the photo is the Red Rose Coat.

A Practical Coat

It was, in theory, designed with practicality in mind: nine-tenths sleeves, narrow cuffs, slit down the back, one hidden breast pocket in the lining and buttoned pockets on the outside. The buttons are of a brass-coloured alloy and they adorn the cuffs, the pockets and the front of the coat. The buttons are only only on the outside of the cuff, so as to prevent it catching on the coat.

The coat is made of a thick wool-linen blend (like many of the other cloaks and coats seen on these pages) and is lined in real silk brocade. It has long, decorative buttonholes and is edged in the brocade lining.

The coat isn't actually black, it's actually a midnight green. That said, unless in direct sunlight, it does look more black than green.

Whether or not it's actually practical, is of course another matter. After all, silk brocade isn't very machine washable, but it is cut to be out of the mud unless a truly horrific site.

In other news: The new Character Kit website is live! Many broken links now litter the Costume Mercenary blog. Please be patient as I rummage through the archives and straighten it all out again.

To commission a similar coat from the Costume Mercenary would cost in the region of £90-110.

More photos under the cut.

Prototype: Buckled Gambeson

The Buckled Gambeson prototype was previously glimpsed in a blurry photograph from the really early days of this blog. Now, it appears again, worn by an axe-wielding hero.

The Buckled Gambeson is made in a brown-green faux suede and padded with two layers of cotton. It's lined in a thick black linen, which also trims the edges of it. It has a very slight standing collar and a row of buckles down the front. The straps of the buckles are made of real leather.

The fantastical sleeve-caps are actually have some grounding in historical costume and were inspired by the decorative "wings" of an Elizabethan padded jerkin. These wings were used to obscure the join between detachable sleeve and the garment. This purpose is somewhat lost in this incarnation since there are no sleeves to attach and the Mercenary is still rather of the opinion that they do look like they belong more between the pages of a Dungeons and Dragons book than in serious history.

Due to it being padded with cotton, it is very warm and is also fully machine washable.

Again, we seem to have the lone hero fending off the demonic tree (it appears to be something of a running theme during this photoshoot).

The Buckled Gambeson is available in medium from Character Kit £75. The live roleplay weaponry can also be found there at very reasonable prices.

It has been suggested that there is a certain cyberpunk potential to the Buckled Gambeson (mostly due to its wonderfully ridiculous sleeves) and the Designer and myself have started to toss around ideas. Any ideas on how kit seen on these pages can recombine (Transformers-eque) into a cyberpunk outfit?

The caped cloak seen worn in the photos is made of a thick black wool-linen. It's lined in a dark blue fake silk, which picks out the dark blue of the swirly trim. It's buckled over the chest with a floral brass buckle. It will soon be availiable for £85 from Character Kit (the saga of website updating continues, not problematic, merely lengthy).

In other News: the Costume Mercenary has finally gotten around to rejuggling her sidebar. The sidebar editor in blogger is painfully user-unfriendly when it gets beyond about five items in length, which seems rather strange since it offers something in the region of a zillion gadgets and widgets. I currently hate the whole system with a rather searing passion.

More photos under the cut.

Preview: One Man against the Tree

The debris from Treasure Trap's annual Banquet (and adjacent socialising) still litters the living room, but the the ridiculously good weather was too good to pass up. The Costume Mercenary awoke to a bright and brilliant day, much to her bleary-eyed horror and despite every fibre of her being rebelling against the thought, the day must be seized.

Our wonderful, wonderful models were mustered and we set out with the intent of photography. We used the back of St Giles Church (also appearing in this set of photos, where last we saw that dashing Steampunk gentleman adventurer and the travel-weary elf) and the College of St Hild and St Bede, which has a number of rather attractive buildings, including the now de-consecrated Chapel of St Hild.

St Giles Church is as lovely as before and the coincidence of shadows meant we were able to take this rather spectacular shot of one man fighting off the demonic tree and its long shadow. (It seems somewhat less heroic once I realised it was slightly reminiscent of the awful cult classic, The Evil Dead, but nonetheless, I am still fond of the shot.)

The above, also rather dramatic shot, is somewhat hindered by the fact that I'm quite aware that our highwayman (or as they were otherwise known, knights of the road) is holding at pistol-point the terribly menacing tree (whose shadow looms over the man in the buckled gambeson in the first photo). Somehow the words Stand and Deliver doesn't quite sound as heroic when one is saying them to plantlife.

St Hilda of Whitby, for whom the college of St Hild and St Bede was partly named (it used to be two single-sex colleges - the edge of it seen in photo to the right), has a number of more mundane facts associated with her - advising of kings, converting England, involvement with the Synod of Whitby - and also some much more exciting, fantastical stories. Such as the sea birds dipping their wings in her honour as they fly over her abbey and the plague of snakes she turned into stone. St Hilda's nuns feature in Sir Walter Scott's epic poem, Marmion: A Tale of Flodden Field in Six Cantos and her snakes-to-stones miracle is briefly recounted therein:

Of thousand snakes, each one

Was changed into a coil of stone,

When Holy Hilda pray'd:

Themselves, without their holy ground,

Their stony folds had often found.

(Marmion, II.245-9)

I'll be sorting through the photos in the coming week and individual posts will follow in due course.

The swords, shields and axes seen in these photos are available from Character Kit.