Doug !!! Talk about old friends ! Thanks for the kind words, old friend, and of course MJF. Awesome reunion of sorts and it almost feels like a good ol time Active Project..just with a company and a bit more formal ! hahahaha.
Also, thank you James for your kind words.
To answer some questions, $960 is TOTALLY INSANE !! Yes, that is not an uncommon saying when it comes to the Premium Editions. That is also a good descriptor for the level of dedication to the real thing people are. A quick story - when we saw the real Solo gear, we were actually floored when we discovered what the materials actually were. Grant it, we experimented in prototyping with various fabrics, linens, cottons and poly's but found that something was missing each time. It wasn't until we did the full commitment to the original materials (as seen in the screen used) that we discovered that the woolens carried a certain body flow and elegance that the replica poly's couldn't achieve. That's when we decided to to do the two levels of commitment on this one, a Premier Edition and a Standard Edition. When you have to absolutely, positively, BE THE PART , thats the Premier Edition will be there for order on our site (which is made in the USA, btw). To steal a line from tuskentrooper : The Premier Line is geared toward the ultimate collector who cannot settle for anything less than the most-accurate licensed replica available. This generally means that fabrics are painstakingly sourced and custom-dyed because they aren't commercially available, and I suspect the economics behind this extra step are not cheap
When you need to look the part and are okay with a little compromise, our Standard Edition will be there for you and not only our site but also our partnering retailer sites.
When it comes to the Han Solo belt, I appreciate everyone's support on that. I am glad most are able to see what we're trying to do with it by simply providing an all inclusive belt from all three movies to the greeblies we had an opportunity to examine and build from the originals. From a costuming standpoint, we are so happy to offer the belt in multiple sizes. We are not just talking about shortening the length of the belt, but instead proportionally changing the wearable size for the stated size range. We took our expertise from making costumes and applied here, where now the cut is proportionally sized for the wearer, so you get the appropriate lay and look, rather than a bulging holster rig that was meant for someone bigger.
As always, we remember what it is to be the customer, so should you need a different size, just contact our customer service team and we'd happily do an exchange just as we have with all our products for the past three years....BUT, please do your best in your initial order (lol).