My Blue and Leather Shield

My latest shield creation is so I can have a tougher shield for shield wall demos. So this one is made of plywood like all the other recreationists in our group use. In summary, I glued a burlap facing on it and painted it blue (my colour). Then I added carved leather ornamentation. The boss is made from an iron bowl that I modified.

Here are the pictures of the steps;

I started with the boss - an iron bowl that I cut and trimmed so it would be about 6" diameter with tabs for rivetting. I used steel wool and lots of elbow grease to remove the rust and polish it a bit. Then coated it with vegetable shortening and heated it all over with a propane torch to season the metal so it wouldn't rust so bad.

The blank (which already had a handle attached), laid horizontally on a table, was coated on the facing side with white glue. Then the burlap stretched over it and smoothed and tacked to hold in place. More white glue, watered down so it would soak in better, was brushed on an the whole face saturated with the water/glue mix. Then it was left to dry.

Burlap added to shield blank. Two more shield blanks behind it.
 

 Next were the leather ornamentation and boss surround pieces. I cut them out of thick leather (the same stuff I use for the soles of my turnshoes).

Basic shape cut out

The design is the same one I used for one of my tent frames. It is my original artwork inspired by extant remains of dragon head tent frames and I wanted to reuse it, especially since the tent frame will likely be used for some furniture items I'm thinking of making. I have two tent frames - I only need one.

Details carved but unstained/unfinished

I made four of these and six of the shield surrounds. Then laid them out along with the boss and trimmed to fit. 

All pieces laid out, trimmed to fit

Next, the facing is painted with a solid blue (Wedgewood Blue) waterproofing stain. Once the first coat was on I added a second, watered down coat as some parts of the wood was not receiving the stain. After all is said and done there are still bits of unstained wood but it is not so noticeable and would be authentic anyway, I think. Note to self: don't use burlap again.



The blue added. Note the outline of the centre boss.

While waiting for the shield to dry it was time to stain and polish the leather pieces.

Stained and polished

I added some leather edging along the inside hole where the boss will go and leather wrapped the handle. The boss and surrounds were rivetted in place (not true rivets but square rosehead nails from Lee Valley) and the dragon head ornaments glued and tacked into place. The last bit to go on was a strip of leather around the rim, stained oxblood red. I'm pleased with the results.


Finished