As you may have noticed in the previous article featuring a steampunk turntable video, at 00:51 the lights on my hat turn on. I called this hat the acetyled tricorn and it was my second most popular prop at the steampunk larp.

I had originally intended to steampunkify my tricorn using working carbide lamps. I discovered those at the same time as urbex and just fell in love with the light they give and with their maintenance rituals. Plus the tiny “miner’s helmet” versions are just so cute, steampunk looking and easy to find on eBay. My first step towards safety was using a leather tricorn instead of the felt ones usually wear at larps. This one came from Ravenswood Leather and I was actually supposed to wear it at Conquest of Mythodea but it arrived late, and I found it a bit too “folded modern hat”-looking. I originally didn’t like its leather straps but they came in handy when it was time to fix the lamps, using the same golden wire I used for the steam kit.

The second step towards safety was taken by the larp’s organizers, who wisely said no to having open flames around. While I would be dressed in leather, other players wouldn’t be and the game site was actually going to be a wooden building! Because I still wanted carbide lamps on my tricorn, I decided to replace their burning components with flickering led tealights.

 

I found those for like a dollar each at the local supermarket, destroyed as much of their plastic casing as I could with cutting pliers and unsoldered one wire. I then unscrewed the burner part from the lamp, and replaced it with the “flame” part of the tealight, i.e. the led. I pushed the cables through the sealed part were the acetylene normally ends up and through the hole into the bottom part where the carbide goes. There I stored what was let of the battery casing with its plastic switch untouched. I then resoldered the wires, switched the light on, screwed the carbide reservoir back on, et voilà, an acetyled tricorn!

Note: once you screw the carbide reservoir back on, there is no more way to access the switch so you need to decide whether you want the lamps on or off. This could be fixed by having the switch on the outside near the led but I’m lazy. The batteries last at least 24h. The flickering was really cool but as lamps they were basically useless to see in the dark: they were mainly to be seen.

 

To steampunkify my fantasy larp boots, (bought at Rêves d’acier in Paris) I simply replaced the leather laces with golden chain from the local hardware store. Just bring the boots and the laces to the store, check that the chain diameter easily goes through the eyelets and ignore the strange looks that the salesman gives you as he cuts the chain to the size of your laces. For ease of insertion, you can use paper clips or some other thing to help pass through the eyelets.

Like the boots, all the rest of the clothes were reused from my 2010 Mythodea costume: the coat was custom made by Silvia i Mario during a trip to Buenos Aires. The pants were thai fishermen’s pants from the local hippie store and viking and standard brown pants from larp vendors at Mythodea. The shirts and vest came from Théatr’hall, the default parisian purveyor of all things 18th century. Here’s how it looked overall, from a pre-larp photoshoot we did to decorate our booth at the exhibit.

Next time: more props, including the Nerf gun!

 

Flattr this!

Tagged with:
 

2 Responses to Steampunk Props Part 2: Lights, Metal and Leather from Head to Toe

  1. […] wouldn’t have a lady in waiting or a squire to dress me up in the morning. And I had already done the actual chain lacing thing for my steampunk character’s boots and that was a real pain in every meaning of the […]

Leave a Reply

Loading Facebook Comments ...

No Trackbacks.

%d bloggers like this: