Help Me Remake This Armor

[PaxAddict]

Hey, folks

So, I'm a costumer. My wife and I pick some of our favorite characters from some of our shows, and we dress up as them for local events. Most notable of these events is CONvergence, which is a sci fi and fantasy convention where people from all around dress up and have essentially a four day party with 10,000 like minded people.

So this year, my wife and I are looking to do Game of Thrones (or, A Song of Ice and Fire, for those of us who are fans of the book series) and I specifically want to do Brynden "Blackfish" Tully. Probably my favorite character from the series. And I have most of the costume figured out and budgeted, with one exception. His awesome "fishscale" leather armor. I've attached a couple shots of the armor, and I've bought a square 3 sided leather punch with rounded corners that is Perfect for this, so I can punch out all the scales by hand, but how do I turn the scales into armor?

My first instinct was to just essentially buy a T-shirt and sew the scales into the shirt. Which is still a viable option for me, but I'm concerned with how it will lay. The scales overlap side to side, so there would be no lateral stretch, but there would be vertical stretch and I don't know how it would look. Additionally, this will be worn over riveted chainmaille, and a t-shirt would probably be torn apart pretty quickly. I'm not confident it would hold up.

So I could rivet the scales to each other, and just make each scale long enough to reach the next row of scales, or rivet each scale to a piece of leather, but I'm concerned with how well it would breathe, and total weight.

Are there any other options you guys can think of, or do.you have any concerns with the options I've brought up?

Thanks!

Wish me luck

[Thor]

I've seen that someplace on YouTube already. You should be able to search for it. Other than that, but it's just a wild guess and only how I would approach it, it's like a shingle roofing, if you know what I mean.

I'd be cutting stripes, use a scribe for marking, punch all ends and make the cuts with a carpetknife, glue and stitch the layers. I wouldn't stitch it on a T-shirt. That's kinda disgusting in time.

If you're looking for the videos to guide you, you can use the search terms lamellar armor.

Good luck and lots of patience.

[PaxAddict]

Oh, man. you're right. Lamellar armor, but have each tab twice as long, so the bottom half of the leather piece covers up the top, stitched half of the row beneath it. I just have the pieces change direction, or stacking, in the middle, so it all comes to a head there. That is totally doable, reasonable, and will require a lot of patience and hand strength as I start punching these all out. That will totally work, though, and was a better idea than I could have ever come up with. With the addition of it being actual, functional armor. Not as functional as standard lamellar, since the extra length is just space for a sword to get caught between scales and cut the stitching open, but functional enough for a costume.

Thank you! And if anyone else has any ideas, I'm still listening.

[Thor]

I just noticed on your pics that the neck area has different sizes than the body itself and that it's not actually half round but quarter round.