tashabear

Fabric store -- ask the nice people who work there for something suitable, like taffeta. Though hopefully Kevin King will chime in; I think he uses cotton novelty print. Taffeta is smooth and silk-like, but the novelty prints give you lots of room for choice of prints: everything from pretty florals for flaming skulls to puppies and kittens to chili peppers and John Deere logos.

So does that mean that you can also make them shorter than normal, too? I have small hands, you see...

Tandy sells both those conchos and the conversion kits.

How many times do they go near i-beams in tourneys, though? Unless... oh boy, funny picture... they cocked their hands back for a wrap and got their gauntlets stuck on the back of their heads... *snerk*

Didn't you hear? We're only enemies for part of the War this year -- there will be at least one battle where the East and the Mid unite against the Allies. I hope there's a breeze that day, or the testosterone fumes will kill us all. Bring comfy walking shoes; Runestone Hill is STEEP. I'm infinitely grateful that my camp snapped up a chunk of the Battlefield camping area when it came open. It's quiet, yet fairly handy to the merchants, and we have great water pressure. If you do decide to make those leather pulls, I hope you'll post pics! I'm kind of tempted to make some myself.

Did that, thinking the same thing. Still $875.ish.

I'm still seeing the metal pull at $874.91.

I don't have the tools to do that (and I think I would go insane while breaking all the stones, since they're only 10mmx14mm), but thank you for the tip. I may be getting an idea, though... That is a GORGEOUS piece of work! Thank you for showing it to me!

Hello, I'm Lady Tasha Medvedeva from Canton of the Towers in the East -- maybe we'll meet at Pennsic! I'm pretty fond of Krylon Hammered Finish spray paint. I used it on some outlet plates and now they look like hammered iron if you don't look too close. :-D You know you're a SCAdian when your house is half-finished, because every time you go to the home store you come away muttering to yourself, "I could make that..."

People with more money (and nicer kitchens) than me, clearly! You know what I'd do, though, is take those pictures to a blacksmith and see what he could do, using those as inspiration. They still wouldn't be cheap (unless you get inspired to make them yourself), but they wouldn't be nearly $900 each, either.

Ooh. That's the ticket right there! I may not need to fret about the stones falling off, then. Thanks so much!

I beg your pardon? That was rude and uncalled for.

It's a really annoying method of compressing files, similar to a .zip file. It's proprietary, though, so you need a program called WinRAR to open it. You can get it as a 40-day free trial here, or you can write back to whomever emailed you the file and see if they can resend it using winzip, which you can open by doubleclicking on it.

Clearly it works for you. Just as clearly, it pisses me off. My copier is my all-in-one inkjet, and since I wasn't a draftsman in a previous life, as I suspect a lot of people weren't, I'd have to play with the percentages to get it right. Why should I waste time and ink and paper when I can just crop the image tight and reset the size to the exact width or height I want? It doesn't stop me from buying or using the patterns, but I thought it was something people should know.

This *is* the downloaded set(s). I don't enlarge stuff on a copier, though; I do it all digitally, as then I (generally) only have to print it once. I can get the exact size I want, working in Photoshop Elements, rather than trial and error mucking about with percentages. It's not a showstopper; it's just frustrating, and a step I don't think I should have to go through.

Even if you could tell me where the article was published, that would be a help. I don't mind doing my own legwork. Any recommendation on what glue to use, or should I ask my jewelry-making friends? Thanks so much!

Great idea, but this needs to be on a curve and very flexible and light, plus I'm doing this for costs: I don't have the time to fiddle with getting all the lengths and shapes right. I'll keep it in mind if I ever want to bling out a flat piece, though. Thanks so much!

You mean Gingher, right? I don't have the Gingher leather shears, but I love and adore my Gingher dressmaking shears.

Nice! I have an idea for some steamy bracers myself, but not Mad Scientist type; more Crazed Artist. Don't need them till July, though, so making them is on the back burner till after this upcoming SCA event.

I'm making a coronet (think crown, but simpler and smaller) for a friend of mine in the SCA. I bought some oval cabochons that I'd like to affix or set into the sides of the coronet, but I'm a little unsure as to how to do it. I could cut away a hole the same size and shape as the stone and glue on a lining, but I'm looking for alternatives, as that will affect the size of the coronet. I don't want to just glue it to the leather, as the reason why I'm not putting on my usual pearls is that her toddler knocks her other coronets off her head and has already broken off the pearls. I need this one to be sturdy and highly toddler-resistant. So... thoughts?

Just a little warning to anyone thinking of buying these patterns: they're shipped at 72 pixels per inch, which looks fine on a computer screen but is pixelated as hell when you go to print it out. You have to increase the resolution to at least 300 ppi before it looks decent printed out. I was able to do a batch process in my editing software, but I didn't want anyone to get the rude surprise I did when I went to look at the images I purchased. The artist is clearly talented, but the download process is cumbersome and archaic and after jumping through all those hoops I still have to edit every single file I got? It makes me a little disgruntled as a customer.

Try a razor knife or box cutter. Shears cause the leather to skew, especially the heavier weights. They're good for rough cuts, but I tend to use a box cutter for the final trimdown.

For that matter, plastic zipties, bundled together and cut to length.

Sadly, there don't seem to be any surviving recliners found in graves from Birka or Visby. I've looked. :-( ;-)

Really? I think I bought mine at Walmart; it was with the other metal polishes, like for silver or copper.