Flair Hanger with Hardware

The hardware for the cut out hanger is all set. Heather's suggestion of an angular pad hook works really well, and I love the contrast of the bright hardware versus the dark brown/red of the leather.



I decided to use the new buckles I cast from the 16th century original as the buckles for this one and I really like them I'm going to use them as the basis for a complete set of hanger hardware for the future.


It needs a little bit of clean up and then its ready to go. If anyone is interested in picking this one up let me know!

Some new castings

I've been doing some pewter casting lately to add accessories to my 16th Century equipment. Little things like buckles and buttons, as well as attempts at medals and pins. I say attempts because those haven't worked so far. The buttons and buckles however, have.

My wife and I worked on doing some roughs of different buttons from finds ranging in dates from 1300's to the early 1600's. After doing the molds and getting everything set here is the first picture of the small button suite, not cleaned up yet.


From left to right we have:

1. Ridged Cone - 16th C
2. Pyramid - 16th C
3. Ball - 14th-17th C
4. Lantern - No providence
5. Acorn - 16th C
6. Shallow Dome - 14th-17th C
7. Cross - 15th C

I also very pleased to have purchased an original 16th century buckle from Talbot's Fine Accessories. I made a mold of it and the first result is great. I plan on using this on belts and hangers.



So some other fun stuff I've been working on. I've got some larger buttons ready to be cast in the next day or so as well.

16th Century German Knife - Finished, with Sheath

Finished up the clean up on the German knife and added a sheath. Sheath is made from a double layer of 2-3 oz oak tanned leather, stitched with waxed linen thread. I dyed it using Tandy Leather's Mahogony oil based dye and buffed out with some beeswax. As much as I hate to I'm going to be putting this one up for sale shortly on a couple of forums. Cost is going to be $65 shipping included to the US.

Elizabethan Woman's Girdle

Woman's clothing confounds me. It is this mystical set of garments that shapes and moves bits around and has whale bone in it, expensive stuff has pearls sewn into it, and all other sorts of chaos. When you look at artwork you see high status women wearing not a traditional belt, but a jewel encrusted delicate work of art that follows the lines of their clothing and drops down the front showing off wealth, station, and possibly even holding a small book or knife.


My wife Heather and friend Shelly like making jewelry and paternosters (medieval and renaissance prayer beads), and decided to try their hand at making what the 'in crowd' of the renaissance called girdles.



Their first attempt is a bronze colored waist chain that comes to a foliate style hub.


From the hub comes a length of green pearls (yes real ones), polished stones, and quartz.



It is really pretty. They are trying to do more for an event coming up in a couple of weeks, and if this is any indication of how they will turn out, they will be very impressive.

16th Century German Knife - It's a Mystery

When looking for knife images, I stumbled across a mid 16th century German knife that I really liked. It had a clip point and a nice long profile. I promptly have lost the picture of the original, but I did my best to remember the shape. I have no idea where the image is and I have yet to be able to find it in any of my files and in my search-fu of the intarnets. Mystery part one.

This past spring I attended the Prairie du Chein rendezvous and bought a set of red wood scales. I'm pretty sure the purveyor of the store said they were bloodwood, but the label that was on the wood had vanished into thin air so I can't be sure. Mystery part two.


No matter what it actually is, I like it. The wood has an amazing color to it. Deep and bright, the red stands out, especially after the light coat of Danish oil on it. I chose copper rivets to pop through the wood color and their bright nature really stands out. The fact that the blade has a clip point to it makes it different from anything else I have made so far. I really like how this one has turned out. The pictures don't do the wood justice, I find it simply stunning.


All the pieces of the puzzle ended up making this one heck of a knife. I'll be doing a sheath for it as well, just got to figure out what color to dye the leather now. Maybe I'll just mix a bunch of colors together and see what happens.

Ale through the Ages - Gratzer Ale Bottling Day

Last night was bottling night for the Gratzer Ale that was made at the Discovery World Museum's Ale through the Ages program. We headed up to the biology lab on the second floor to see the volunteers hard at work sanitizing equipment. The class participants were invited to bring Polish beers to sample, and we were able to try the same Berliner Weiss from the first class. Another 2 weeks in the keg did amazing things to it. This one was brewed outdoors during one of the Lakefront's many festivals and was inoculated with a wild strain of yeast if I'm not mistaken. The two weeks it spent in the keg between classes changed the beer significantly. It went from a slight thin and sour taste, with citrus notes to a full on sour. It had the horsey sourness of the wild yeast coupled with the citrus notes making it a totally different animal. The acid level tasted high to me, and I started craving some bread and oils to mellow out the flavors in my mouth.

We took a look at the two carboys that were used to ferment the beer and noticed some substantial differences. One carboy was done with a White Labs Kolsch yeast that Keven mentioned too a bit longer to get going. This one did not have any clarifying/fining agents added to it and had a soft amber color that had the distinct haze of a wheat beer. The second carboy was done with a Wyeast German Wheat strain and had Isinglass added as a fining agent. Isinglass is an agent taken from the air bladder of a sturgeon and was used as a clarifying agent historically. This carboy had a darker color to it, and you could see coagulated material in a low suspension. Once we had taken note of the different yeast strains we were instructed on how the bottling would proceed and we began in earnest.

The bottling session is a group affair. One person per carboy manned the bottling wand, filling bottles off the carboy for us. The bottles moved then to a capping table where members of the class vigorously capped the bottles using hand cappers. They then moved down to a labeling table where folks took labels that Kevin had designed and adhered them to the bottle. The process for adhering was interesting as we used a simple 20ld weight paper with laser printing, and milk. The back of the label was dipped into milk and then pressed firmly onto the bottle creating a bond. Excess milk was wiped off and the label was on nice and tight. Kevin said that he had learned the process from a professor of his who was a homebrewer herself. He has had bottles last years with the milk label, but it is susceptible to water, so no ice in the cooler with these. I was on a labeling station and had good conversation with folks around the table while working. It was also nice to sample a few of the smoked ales that people brought to share.

Overall the atmosphere was very relaxed, friendly and an all around good time. When done we were allotted one bottle of each type and if you wanted to stick around and converse a bit there would be left overs. I stuck around for a bit talking to some folks that do history oriented tasks and a few more seasoned brewers about how they do things (and getting tips on my cherry wheat I have going right now) and was able to leave with an extra bottle or two for some good friends that weren't able to make it to this session.

I had a blast and am hoping I'll be able to do more of these. There is a Colonial Porter class in December that sounded great, and Kevin announced three more classes after the first of the year begining with a Medieval Gruit, a traditional Milwaukee wheat, and a Scotch/Irish Heather Ale. I'm hoping some of my brewing compatriots will be able to join me, but even if they don't I know I'm going to try and make it down!

Kevin has put up information from this last session on his site which chronicles the archeology wing of the Discovery World Museum.

http://distantmirror.wordpress.com/

Buttons Rule

I love the look of thread covered buttons, and they are totally period for the 16th century. I hate, I mean HATE, making thread covered buttons. I also don't want to spend an arm and a leg in shipping costs to get really good period buttons from the UK because, well this is a hobby and my money needs to go to real life costs. So I set a goal to make some buttons that I and the folks I do my hobbies with could use. I looked through artwork and used some creative license to make up a few trial buttons.


What we've got from top around clockwise is a simple round, a flower bud (first ever work by my wife Heather, which I think is pretty awesome), pyramid, lobed cone, and a faceted one, that kind of looks like a lamp post. I need to get some more molding materials on order but when I do I'm going to give these a go.

More Sword Hanger Flair

I did some clean up on the cut outs and cut the strapping for the buckles over the weekend. For the color I wanted something that would make the buckles and other hardware pop, so I went with Fiebings Mahagony. It came out darker than normal so I may need to check my dye, but it still has red tones despite how dark it is.


My wife made the suggestion to switch up the pad hook a bit, seeing as all the pierce work is angular. My current pad hooks are lobed, either single or double, so I took one of the double lobes and made it more angular. What you see in the pictures is the rough finish of both the hanger and pad hook.


I've started to recondition the leather as the dye tends to dry it out. The pad hook is in the middle stages of shaping, with the roughing out done and the polishing and clean up not started yet.


More to come!

Sword hanger with flair!

This past summer I made a hanger that had my first attempt at pierce work on the leather. It turned out pretty well and I backed it with a rich gold cotton velvet to make it stand out. I ended up cutting out 4 more hanger parts this weekend and picked one to try an experiment on.

I wanted to do some more pierce work and also try doing some tooling work. I've never done tooling before but I saw how a friend of mine did it, so I figured what the heck. This is my second attempt at pierce work and my first at some basic geometric tooling on a hanger. So far I like how it looks. It isn't perfect by any means but its a good start, and with practice I think I'll get closer to what I have in my mind's eye and really enjoy what I'm producing.

Because these posts are useless with out pictures...


A wide shot:


A bit of a close up on the work area:


What's that on the left side? Oh it may just be some buttons Heather and I are working on to cast.




More pictures will be forth coming. Its set to be a 5 buckle hanger, I just need to figure out what color to choose.

Interpretation of a late 16th C/early 17th C Baldric

How do you hold a sword up without tripping on it or hitting people as you walk? By wearing the correct suspension for your sword of course! This is a project from the summer that I've done some recent tweaking on. Sword belts and hangers are by far the most common thing seen in material finds and artwork for the mid to late 16th Century in Europe. Every now and then (I can think of three out of all the images I've ever looked at) you see an over the shoulder suspension represented prior to 1620. One of the folks I do Bristol with, really prefers something that is able to do both over the shoulder and at the waist for carrying his sword. He wanted something to wear that would work with both his soft kit and when wearing his armour without a whole bunch of unhooking and resetting sizes etc. I racked my brain for a while and took my inspiration from two particular images. The first, a picture of a Lieutenant in Tomas Lant's depiction of the Funerary Procession for Sir Phillip Sidney, seen here:


and the image of a hunter/keeper of hounds:



To this end I put together something that can be adjusted to be worn as a baldric, but also tightened up to be worn at the waist. The sword position when worn at the waist puts the sword at a similar position to what is seen with integral belt suspensions on medieval longswords and single hand swords.

Here's some pictures of it in the baldric configuration modeled by the ever photogenic Ed.


And a close up of the suspension itself.



From all accounts and purposes it works well while marching and on the move, so I consider it a success! I will try to get a photo or two of it in the waist belt position shortly.

16th Century Utility knife

A friend of mine, Aaron, made amazing knives and scabbards. I had the distinct joy of working with him on several projects and learning how to do some of the basic skills he knew. I found that I really like working with metals and making knives. So thumbing through different images on the web and books on the Mary Rose wreck I found a couple of knife shapes that worked for mid to late 16th century use. I started work on a those shapes over a year ago and finally decided to finish up some of the work.

Most every person in the 16th century would have had a utility knife that they owned and carried. This was the case through most of history up until our modern societal changes. A good knife can be used for a variety of tasks and it has been a goal to recreate some of these simple utilitarian style knives for sale and my own impressions.

I didn't take any during the build process shots on this one, but at the very least I can describe my process. I sourced a piece of steel to cut the knife blanks out of. My piece for this series of knives came from a piece of o1 tool steel, an Oil Hardening steel that holds an edge well an is durable. I then scaled out a pattern based on the drawings and images from my searches to a template. I then traced this template out on the steel and the blades were cut out using a bandsaw. From there the blade shapes were ground out and the basic profiles were shaped using grinding wheels and belt sanders. Once the basic shaping is done the blades need to be heat treated so they maintain their edge and strength. For this I the amazingly awesome OlliN Sword Designs were able to treat my pieces for a modest fee. Once the blades came back from heat treat, I set about the finish grinding, making any adjustments to the blade profile and setting an edge. Then comes scaling, that is putting on the handle. The knives for this set are scaled, so there are two blocks of wood that need to be shaped and sized to match the handle. The scales are fixed to the handle using pins and adhesives and then finish shaped.

The final product is a knife that I think is pretty darn nice, and from my own experience holds up very well to every day uses as well as reenactment. The first knife of this series is a simple utilitarian piece. The blade was one that I saw in a nautical scenario of which I can't find the picture anymore. Its got a nice stiff back to it, and the short handle fits very well in the hand. The wood is cocobolo, a central American wood, with beautiful coloring. The pictures don't really do the blonde streaking of the wood justice, but here we go! All these pictures are before the final polishing of the blade.

The whole piece:

A close up of both sides of the handle. Unfortunately my flash washed out some of the beautiful coloring on the wood. I treated the handle with some Danish Oil and will be working in beeswax this evening.


And the knife in hand for a sense of size.



I'm very please with how this turned out. Its a great little knife. It will be for sale, $65 and will include a leather sheath for carrying.

Ale through the Ages - Gratzer Ale

On a trip down to the Milwaukee Zoo with my family, we stopped into the Northern Brewer store. I needed to pick up some yeast for an Irish Draught kit I was doing and they are very close. On the counter as I was checking out was a flier for "Ale through the Ages: The Anthroplology and Archeology of Brewing", a program run by the Discovery World Museum in Milwaukee. It instantly grabbed my attention, because I am a bit of a history geek (quiet you), and I love recreating historical minutia. There were three sessions listed, but unfortunately I had plans already for the first one. The second, a 15th century style Gratzer Ale, was doable so I registered up and made the drive down.

http://programs.discoveryworld.org/archives/1497

First off, the last time I was at Discovery world was when it was in the lower level of the Milwaukee Public Museum, eons ago. Heading down to the new (to me) site was awesome, and the place is beautiful. I got there a bit early due to traffic being cooperative so I walked around the Great Lakes exhibit for a bit prior to starting. The class itself was $20 ($15 if you are a member of the museum), was about 1.5 hours and was held in their Digital Theatre space which was very comfortable and conducive to a good viewing environment. As you walked into the space you were greated with the recipe (both all-grain and partial mash), some Northern Brewer SWAG, and an opportunity to sample a young Berliner Weiss they had recently brewed up. They did the brewing on the street during a recent event and used a wild yeast strain that gave the Weiss a distinct citrus and sour taste. It was quite good, if a bit young, and set the mood for the beer we were about to see being made.

Archeology Associate Kevin Cullen led the discussion on brewing and the history of the style of beer we were seeing. The audience was a mix of new to brewing, experienced brewers and students of anthro/archeology. Kevin did a very nice job of keeping things on a level that worked for all the audience covering topics like how brewing is accomplished, what grains are used historically, and the basics of brewing history. While he did this to volunteers with the museum assisted him in stirring the mash they had started prior to class, transferring the mash to a secondary pot, sparging the grain, and the other physical tasks. When we started to get into discussions about the specific brew we were working with, Kevin used his power point presentation to show the region we were talking about (Western Germany and Poland) and the historic documentation we have about the ancient, medieval and early modern brewing process. It was a lovely look at images from various hausbuchs, gravity breweries, monasteries, and the physical landscape. Tied into the history of Europe was the brewing industry's history in Milwaukee and Wisconsin and a digression of how was here during the beer boom as well as the places that are reviving the old traditions today.

A great deal of information was given out via lecture form, but it was a well presented lecture that did not make me feel like I was sitting back in a hall with 300 students hoping my TA understood what the guy was talking about because I had no clue. Kevin showed an ease with the material asking opinions and clarifications of some of the experienced brewers and professors in the audience. During the entire time the air took on the wonderful aroma of smoked wheat (which Kevin smoked himself) as the beer progressed through the boil. One very nice thing was having the ingredients of the beer be passed around for us to smell, feel, and sample. It really gave you a good sense as to where the beer was headed.

The end of the time saw the beer go into two carboys ready for a short two week fermentation. Free form discussions afterwards took place, but as I had a hour and a half drive home I thanked Kevin for the presentation and headed out. In two weeks the class is invited back for the bottling, where we will do the work and get the chance to take home some samples of the beer.

I had an excellent time and am hoping that I'll be able to do more of these classes. There is a colonial porter one in December that sounds great!

Kevin's Blog can be seen here:

http://distantmirror.wordpress.com/