studded leather surcoat / quilted gambeson - need patterns...help me out?

[Sir Kentaslas]

Alright so the Faire is comin' to town in a few months, which still leaves time to make my own bad-weed puller costume.
However, my friends and I have decided to hold back on the costume, especially on account of weather. To see what I mean, either come to Texas, or read my post in the heat-stroke avoidance thread. <- major kudos to whoever posted that. Last year the ambulance took a guy who got heat exhaustion. 'Course he was wearing like...12 layers of heavy-duty quilted linen. But still I felt sorry for the guy. The village council then held an emergency meeting to re-elect a village elder. LOL

But I digress.

Anyway, after watching the King Arthur movie (the one with Clive Owen), and playing Mount and Blade (best PC game ever), I have decided to wear regular everyday clothes but with a surcoat over it. Again, I would do the whole get-up, but the heat makes it unbearable. Down here, it's like 85-90 degrees year-round. With humidity at about the same or slightly higher. I've since then changed my mind. I've decided instead to go with a studded leather coat similar to this:

(Its the guy second from the right)
Link: http://www.wcnews.com/newershots/full/arthur_knights.jpg

here's another pic when he's swinging his axe from overhand and you can see his armour better: http://www.hotflick.net/flicks/2004_King_Arthur/004KAR_Ray_Stevenson_001.jpg


One of my friends wants to make a quilted gambeson similar to the one seen underneath the brigandine linked below.
Link: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/7b/Brigfront.jpg
He however wants it done in black, with silver thread for the diamond stitching. He also wants it to be longer, like a surcoat, with short sleeves, zipper up the front (like a jacket), with the zipper hidden by a fold-over flap that Velcro's over it, thus hiding the zipper. He also has an appliqué of a dragon that he already made that he wants to slap on there on the upper left chest area.

my question is, do any of y'all known where I can find good patterns that will make these turn out good, and arent too hard to do?

[lady serena]

The best that I can tell you is check out this site it has alot of armor patterns.
http://www.armourarchive.org/patterns/

[angusmacinnes]

Have you given any thought on attempting to contact the costume designer for the movie.  Never know might have some luck.

[Sir Kentaslas]

Have you given any thought on attempting to contact the costume designer for the movie.  Never know might have some luck.

Wow, really? I never thought of that.

[DonaCatalina]

I used this one to make a quilted gambeson. I bought some prequilted cotton fabric to use as the lining. I sewed each piece to the outer linen by following the quilted seams. I had to add a large gusset to the armpit to allow him to fight in it but it turned out great.
You might have to look long and hard to find cotton quilted fabric nowdays but t is out there.
And the pattern is not nearly as difficult as some of the other Period Patterns out there.

[crazyrennie]

You may also want to try SCA armor sites
another term for gamesons is "padded jacks"
as someone who wears brig armor I can attest it gets hot really fast