South Tower Armouring Guild Newsletter.

Introductory Message
    Winter of 2011
     February News
William Fedun, Proprietor,
South Tower Armouring Guild



Happy New Year

Up Coming Events!
Upper Canada Village show was fine!  Going to do it in 2012.  This is their link. http://www.medievalfestival.ca/  I'll be there, showing off some armour, and chatting with the crowds! 
Osgood Medieval Festival a month later. 6 to 8 July, 2012.   A stunning show.  This is their link. http://www.osgoodemedievalfestival.com/News.html   In both cases there will be medieval jousters, troubadours, and Brenda tells me that she has a wood fired pizza vendor AND a Belgian Waffle Cart.  Hmmm.  Come for the food alone!

As well, we will be attending a non-medieval show....the Toronto Fan Expo  next August. They asked me for a bio...I think I am going to be a "guest" there.  Not quite sure what that means. But I am planning to have a lot more armour made for the show.

Of course, those are for next summer, but upcoming is Brenda's Birthday tournament on the 17th of September 2011, and of course, the fifth annual "pumpkin cutting massacre" the first weekend in November.  (Both will feature bonfires, fighting, and a LOT of assorted weapons. 

New Line of Swords

Better than factory made swords, less expensive than antiques.   I have put some of Tom Kazor's "rescue" swords up on my "Featured Item" pages for you to check out, and see how drop dead gorgeous a simple weapon can be!  These are the swords they wrote sagas about!

Medieval Armour Projects
What going on in the forge...

The two piece armour seems to be the most popular.  And I have a couple of new tasset designs. Click TwoPiece to see the two piece armour designs. They are looking better and better all the time!  And I think I might have finally perfected the "South Tower Spaulders".  click Spaulders to see those, or just go to page "two" of the single pieces section of the armoury.

Body Armour Cuirass. Breast/back/faulds/tassets.

  One, Two and Three Piece combos. 
      Hottest armours are my three piece suit (click ThreePiece) in several of its forms.  (I can get real creative with this suit!), my flip up visor helm (click VisorHelm)  Other hot items are my Chain Mail instruction book (I wrote the book on chainmail !) I have even made a "Lady Armour", sort of a three piece armour made a little different so ladies can wear them comfortably...You can see those in the brand new Princess's Chambers . This is armour, not fantasy...grin!

Armour Making...South Tower Saturdays!!!

(look at the smiles!  Think they were having fun?)

The Flea Market is new and updated. New price reductions. (The idea is to keep dropping the prices until they hit zero.... Click FleaMarket.

Rentals....
I finally have enough armours that I can offer them as rentals!  I have a couple of nice stainless steel armours which always look pretty, and of course, my battle swords are always available for plays and pagents. Furs, banners, flags, sword belts, I got 'em all!   Email me stag@southtower.on.ca for all your medieval rental needs. A. J. Ermenc will be handling all the rentals, freeing me up to make stuff. 

Professional Development Projects
      Got back year before last from visiting the Palace Armoury in Malta, where I took measured drawings of a gorgeous "splinted" armour; and again this year, an exhaustive measured drawing session involving spaudlerers. Last winter, I was scouring the museums in (of all places) Cyprus.  There is not so much the artifacts themselves, but rather the paintings and castles.    I have several projects which I have fully documented, most are only partially documented.  I have put some of this information up on my blog......most recent blog posts are at the top.

Internal Links of interest 

            How to make a breastplate .....................
            How to make a back plate .......................
            How to make a Bayonette .......................
                      and the finished item ......................
            How to make a greave .............................
             My Post and Beam experience...............
               and the eventual result....grin! ...............
                Muskets here   and   here............

     The skinny on the South Tower Spaudlers ....
 

   Fight classes.  

    are proceeding as normal at Algonquin College and also at the Plant Baths, on Preston Street at Gladstone, right in the heart of little Italy here in Ottawa.

Basic Course....Algonquin Woodruff Campus, the gym in the "P" building.
Course Code GEN0088.  cost for this course is $160.57 incl HST  This is a non-credit Algonquin General Interest course, and as such is payable entirely to Algonquin College. (On line or at the Registrar's desk just inside the doors at the Admin building.)  
Wednesday evenings, 7 to 9:30,  January 18th to February 29th 2012

Algonquin College Registrar's Office is 1385 Woodruff Ave, Rm. C150, Ottawa Ont., K2G 1V8.  tel 613-727-0002, or 1-800-565-4723, fax613-727-7754  email AskAlgonquin@algonquincollege.com

  Why go through the college?  Now you have to remember, what you get out of the college is this.  Algonquin is keeping the lights on, providing free (shoveled) parking and insurance, and providing us with gym, change room and locker space. They have to arrange this attractive gym space with the owners, the Police Services Department.  If we don't get eleven or more sign ups, they will not do all the "behind the scenes stuff" which is required to get this course in place.  And they need those sign ups a week in advance.  If you delay and wait for the day of, they might well cancel the course on us.  So don't procrastinate!  Call ME if you have problems.  613-821-1846 

(As of Friday, January 6th, we have 8 sign ups for the basic, and 2 for the advanced!   Yaaay!)

European Chivalrous Handling Course...Level 1 Plante Baths (18 hours) Sunday mornings 10:30 to 12:30
Plante Recreation Centre, 730 Sommerset St. West (at Preston)....  Phone to register at 613-232-3000

The basic course is needed to get started in sword handling and be able to do it safely, a good grounding.  Not a lot of "dirty tricks", but you get all the basic moves required to aquit yourself as a competent swordsman on the field.  

    Chivalrous Sword Handling at Plante Baths... Level 1
    Sun @ 10:30 am – 12:30 pm   Jan 8 – Mar 18th.   Course code number 670440
    Cost... $137.50  
     Location....Preston Room Plante Recreation Centre, Ottawa. 

The courses at the plante bath are  quite different from the courses at Algonquin.  There is more chain maille, and none of the Japanese Katana work which we do at Algonquin College. 

European Chivalrous Handling Course...Level 2  Plante Baths (taught concurrently with basic course above, a remarkable 18 hours!)
Plante Recreation Centre, 730 Sommerset St. West (at Preston)   (Sunday afternoons, 01:30 to 03:30)

(thats a PDF file, and I am in "Adult, General Interest" on page 106)  Sign up here.... or phone to register at 613-232-3000 

Our Own Chivalrous Swordhandlers website
       And there is a new forum as well, http://sword-handling.whatsupdark.com/   which is Shayne's site.  Lets see if we can make it rock!  Coming soon...a "find a ride forum", and a "how to make armour" forum.  This is "web 2.0" at its best.

Brooms...
     Other things on the go as well.  Brenda really did make a whole pile of (believe it or not!) handwoven brooms!  These are lovely, you know, the nice handmade ones with the braided heads, the H. Potter specials!    They look exactly like a handmade broom from 1867.  She got fancier than that though...with  brooms of different lengths, double headed brooms, and so forth.    I have finally built a page called the " broom squires page" up there in the palace.  If you have a special stick all carved up (ahem)  in the best Pagan fashion, and you want Brenda to brush it, we do that.  Again, you have any ideas, let me know.  (stag@southtower.on.ca) Just remember, sometimes specialty materials are hard to come by at different times of the year....like willow should be harvested in the spring, and corn husks in the fall! 

Swords on Line, Knives on Line
       Gradually getting away from selling factory production swords here on these pages....what with EBay and sites like CheapCrapolla dot com, the quality has dropped along with the price.   I can't and won't sell used, shopworn or damaged swords like so many EBay stores are doing!   I will be selling a lot of nice stuff at the shows, and of course, in my showroom, and may even put some of it up on these pages, but generally speaking, I shall only carry really nice stuff, stuff I am really proud of. Like Tom Kazor's antique "rescue" swords, and my own handmade and re-hilted daggers and knives.     I shall continue to carry swords made by CAS  Hanwei, and Bermejo in my showroom, and perhaps even post part or all of my inventory up on these pages, but of course, armour is where its at right now.   Swords on these pages  may be inexpensive, they are NOT cheap. I only carry swords which I consider to be excellent value for the money.

  Oh, and just so you know...this web domain site, like me, is large, cumbersome, and often out of date!  I notice that  some of the pages are really dated....they are only there to hold space for something more important to put up there, such pages are clearly marked when you drop into them.  I hereby state that IF the knive or sword is still offered, and IF I can still get it, then I WILL honour the price shown. 
      Below are some of the sword companies I will continue to deal with for the forseeable future.  They all have web sites of their own....and special orders are really easy to do. 
        

Bermejo Swords...  Bermejo is based in Toledo, Spain, and they have been making premium swords since 1911.  Bermejo swords are tool steel, oil tempered.  Don't let the heavy gold plating on the crisply detailed brass furniture and chrome plating on the sword fool you...these swords are ready for fighting.  In fact, they are "issue" swords to many of the armies in the world.  Therefore they are VERY pretty, light, quick, and surprisingly serviceable.  And for a serviceable sword, they are also surprisingly inexpensive.  You can see a nice sampling of the swords in the "contemporary swords" area in the map above. (Go to "weapons shop!) 

Hanwei Swords ... The state of the art in sword making today are the Hanwei swords.  Justly famous, they single handedly overturn the accepted ideas about Chinese quality....Hanwei makes really good swords, and due to an accident of international currency exchange, very inexpensive for  North Americans.  This state of affairs will not last. (I note that prices of the China made swords have increased by 23 percent in the last year!  Its starting!)

In the showroom....
(Open by chance or appointment...call to be sure I am here....613-821-1846.)  Open most Saturdays during the year unless I am away at the Ren Faires! Other days by appointment.

       You can also find in the showroom fighting gloves in both goat skin and deer skin, padded vests, South Tower Armouring Guild Tee shirts and patches, and a huge quantity of knives and swords that never quite seem to be put onto the web site. People have told me I should charge admission to walk through my showroom! I have plenty of armours on display, my personal collections,  and lets face it, I built it because Brenda was tired of stubbing her toes on chain mail shirts lying in her living room.  So that is where I put all the cool stuff.  So if you find yourself in the Ottawa area.....please drop in. 

   Armour Backlog schedules...
     The queue is about two weeks long right now...I won't be able to start anything until mid February.  So, I although I am taking orders, I won't take your money until I am due to start.  Gives you enough time to communicate exactly what you have in mind. 

Traveling to your place to train you....
    Tremendous interest.    I still travel to various dojos and instruct in broad blade fencing.  Not too bad, the basic course  is $600.00 (Canadian dollars)(no limit on number of  students) plus expenses for two evening seminars of four hours each, (or one loooooong day!).   This is about on par with the usual rates charged by M.A. seminars....and I have never had anybody tell me it wasn't worth it! 

 Formal Armour Making Classes.....
     I occasionally get folks who want hands-on formal lessons in armour making.  Either as a student, employee, or an apprentice.  Yeah, its kick ass cool. Its also hard work, so slackers need not apply   click HERE to see what you have to bring to the table if you want to work in my shop for more than a standard Saturday open house.  Any school that wishes to have me teach formal classes may check out my lesson plan HERE. 

Surfing the web...
      I have a personal blog, http://southtowerarmouringguild.blogspot.com/.  Its where I put my finished articles so the customer (and everybody else) can see them.  Its a sort of running diary of stuff which comes out of my shop, plus a lot of armour pictures from Museums around the world.  Please note,  I refuse to judge anybody else's work or web site, or comment upon them in any way. I dont mind if anybody else comments on my work.  Even a critical comment, if well thought out, can improve "something" about this little operation here.  (Oh, and Mr. Anonymous...remember, we have swords..grin!).    (Leave Comments here.)

School Demos... 
      As fun as they are, they cut into my shop time....so the charge for doing a school demo is $90.00 (travel and prep time), plus $45.00 per hour, plus HST (for class time).   For that you get me, Brenda (a registered TA in the OCDSB), a suit of armour I can dress a teacher or big student in, a couple of chain mail coifs and mantles for kids to try on, a chain mail shirt they can try on, instruction in chain mail making, the instructional booklet and a few pounds of rings.  In addition to the rules of chivalry and  names of the armour, we cover heraldry and chain maille making.   I am only available in Eastern Ontario.   Email me at stag@southtower.on.ca.  Or phone me at 613-821-1846 to set up a time.  Teachers may rent classroom resources, but that is a different thing entirely.  email me if you think this might be an option. I have lots of stuff!  stag@southtower.on.ca

    click here to see the classes in action.....
 

 To the US Based Customer.......as of  January 2012

The Canadian Dollar is nearly identical with the US dollar as of November 2011   

I have to pick a baseline price...and that is Canadian, because my bank is Canadian, and so credit cards are processed in Canadian funds.

 Normally the US banks don't have a problem with currency exchanges, but keep an eye on them.  They are only human, and have been known to miss a Canadian transaction.  Watch your credit card statement and make sure they handle the exchange rate correctly. 

Americans only pay one tax....a ten dollar and seventy five cent border crossing "paperwork" fee. Doesn't matter the size of the order....the fee is the same. 

 Shipping in the US is figured from Ogdensburg, New York, either US Mail, or Fed Ex ground...your choice. I email you the tracking numbers. 

Terms

I don't take advance money until it is time to make your item.  Then I require at least half down before I start....and the second half before I ship. 

I DO request  full  advance payment for customized portions of the work.  This might include drawings...depends on how elaborate the customizing will need to be! Changes halfway through the job will be costly, better to sort it all out on paper first!  You can figure on a development charge to design a custom armour.  Sometimes a slight mod is no big deal...say scalloping the edges or replacing a lace with a buckle.   A major change from the templates might involve a significant customizing fee.  Just so you know.  I don't do anything until such charges are cleared by you.

  Returns on stock items....no problem.  No questions asked. No restocking  charges, but YOU pay the shipping. 
                   No returns on custom items, (who else would wear it?) 
                    No Refunds for the the customized portion of a returned stock item.

   If I cannot complete your custom project I will  return your money. (of course!) 
                    If there is an undue delay in making your item, I will let you know, and you can cancel your order.
                   Jogging my elbow with weekly requests for updates does not bother me at all. 
  Good drawings help to avoid disputes. 
                    A photograph of you front and side (in a tee shirt is fine) will go a long ways to tailor your armour correctly.

  Shipping costs are non-refundable

                    When comparing prices, please keep un-advertised costs such as hidden handling fees in mind. Sometimes that great deal on "Cheap Swords dot com" might not be so great once all the nickle and dimes are factored in.

Customer service is not just some marketing buzz word, it really IS the biggest edge I have over the big companies. When you talk to me, you are talking to the boss.  stag@southtower.on.ca

The South Tower Armouring Guild is run by strict guidelines involving environmental sustainability, fair play, fair wages and safe working conditions for my employees, and I take personal responsibility for anything we do, make or sell.   click HERE for the complete manifesto.  An ecological footprint is inevitable...I choose to make it a light one.