Ever since Marvel's Daredevil aired on Netflix back in April I just fell in love with the "Black Suit" the team of designers went with. This is such a powerful, unique and extremely well though out look that as soon as I finished binge watching the show, I decided that this would be the first full costume I'd tackle.
The fact that most of this outfit is made from "off the shelf" items was also an incentive even if had to settle for close enough options when it comes to the shirt and pants (I went with the current available generation of Powel pants from G-Star and settled for the current 8800R shirt from McDavid).
However no outfit would be complete without the iconic Black Mask and stick holster. Those were obviously not off the shelf, so I decided to commission a friend of mine to make these.
Some of you might know that I did offer a few masks for sale here in three (hopefully) successful runs.
I spent a long time tracking a fabric that would offer the right amount of stretch, that would also look the part and have a texture close enough to the screen used fabric. We then spent a long time developing a accurate pattern and testing various build configurations to end up with a mask that is comfortable to wear and that allows you to see fairly well without being seen. As a customer put it the mask is a deceptively complicated piece that is a lot more difficult to get right than it seems. In the end I'm really happy with my masks (I kept one as a spare, I don't trust myself on Halloween night) and all those that were sold during the course of the three runs I managed.
Here are a few pictures to show you the finished mask. Unfortunately at the time I didn't think to ask my friend to take a few pics of the process.
So now that we are out of fabric (and really desperately looking for more, I already spent and entire afternoon trying to track few more meters down) we moved on to our next project, the thigh holster.
I went shopping for supplies on Wednesday and was lucky enough to find pretty close materials, especially the fabric used which I, along with a few other people incorrectly thought was Cordura. We've been debating for the last couple of days, using an insane amount of screen-caps to determine how the holster was built. One of the things we agreed on early was that there was no kind of plastic support in the holster. The thing deforms when Matt pulls out the sticks, when he runs or fights which is not compatible with the use of plastic pipes or other alternatives using a rigid support for the batons. But we also wanted to find a way for the holster to keep its shape even when it doesn't hold anything. My friend manage to find a way to build the holster that actually does the trick.
As for the sticks its been difficult but we chose to go with 1" wide solid beech dowels. There's been a lot of back and forth with 1.25" dowels but in the end they just look too thick. For the length of the sticks and the holster we decided to go with a custom size based on my frame (I'm 5'5" so pretty short). Using a bunch more screen-caps we went with 16" sticks and a 10 5/8" high holster. Those are probably not the screen used dimensions but we thought it would be better to have these things scaled to the wearer. The good news is once we'll be ready to start a run we will probably be able to offer personalized holsters (and sticks for those who may be interested) based on your own measurements.
My friend started working on the prototype today and she sent me a few pictures of the progress so far.
As usual sound off with your thoughts below and stay tuned for more updates.
The fact that most of this outfit is made from "off the shelf" items was also an incentive even if had to settle for close enough options when it comes to the shirt and pants (I went with the current available generation of Powel pants from G-Star and settled for the current 8800R shirt from McDavid).
However no outfit would be complete without the iconic Black Mask and stick holster. Those were obviously not off the shelf, so I decided to commission a friend of mine to make these.
Some of you might know that I did offer a few masks for sale here in three (hopefully) successful runs.
I spent a long time tracking a fabric that would offer the right amount of stretch, that would also look the part and have a texture close enough to the screen used fabric. We then spent a long time developing a accurate pattern and testing various build configurations to end up with a mask that is comfortable to wear and that allows you to see fairly well without being seen. As a customer put it the mask is a deceptively complicated piece that is a lot more difficult to get right than it seems. In the end I'm really happy with my masks (I kept one as a spare, I don't trust myself on Halloween night) and all those that were sold during the course of the three runs I managed.
Here are a few pictures to show you the finished mask. Unfortunately at the time I didn't think to ask my friend to take a few pics of the process.
So now that we are out of fabric (and really desperately looking for more, I already spent and entire afternoon trying to track few more meters down) we moved on to our next project, the thigh holster.
I went shopping for supplies on Wednesday and was lucky enough to find pretty close materials, especially the fabric used which I, along with a few other people incorrectly thought was Cordura. We've been debating for the last couple of days, using an insane amount of screen-caps to determine how the holster was built. One of the things we agreed on early was that there was no kind of plastic support in the holster. The thing deforms when Matt pulls out the sticks, when he runs or fights which is not compatible with the use of plastic pipes or other alternatives using a rigid support for the batons. But we also wanted to find a way for the holster to keep its shape even when it doesn't hold anything. My friend manage to find a way to build the holster that actually does the trick.
As for the sticks its been difficult but we chose to go with 1" wide solid beech dowels. There's been a lot of back and forth with 1.25" dowels but in the end they just look too thick. For the length of the sticks and the holster we decided to go with a custom size based on my frame (I'm 5'5" so pretty short). Using a bunch more screen-caps we went with 16" sticks and a 10 5/8" high holster. Those are probably not the screen used dimensions but we thought it would be better to have these things scaled to the wearer. The good news is once we'll be ready to start a run we will probably be able to offer personalized holsters (and sticks for those who may be interested) based on your own measurements.
My friend started working on the prototype today and she sent me a few pictures of the progress so far.
As usual sound off with your thoughts below and stay tuned for more updates.
Last edited:
