Shannan Costume – Belt and Quiver

Since Goodwill tends to have belts for around $1- $1.50, we grabbed a number of leather belts to try out.

The middle belt ended up being the winner. Rather than being the typical one, maybe two-toned belt, this one was multi-toned and multi-layered. It had a gorgeous rich dark red running the length of the belt next to the cognac brown. And being used, it already came pre-distressed! The belt was way too big for me but we had no leather-punching tools, so we decided to just play around with wrapped the belt around itself. It’s worked every time since!

The quiver, on the other hand, was the exact opposite from the belt in terms of difficulty. While the belt was easy as Easy Mac, the quiver was vastly more complicated. Like the bracers, I didn’t want to have the typical tube with arrows stuck in it. I turned again to the Rangers of Ithilien and found their quivers to be both functional, different looking, but not enough to not be recognisable as a quiver. However, I have no idea how the craftsman at Weta created them, so I had to come up with my own method.

After deciding upon exact measurements, my dad and I created a quiver template in Adobe Illustrator. I then traced the template onto paper Mrs. Elrod gave me to use for a pattern.

I then cut out the middle diamond of the exterior of the quiver as the arrow bag would show through it.

Afterwards, I traced the template onto the pattern paper and labeled it accordingly.

Yep, it’s true. I’m horrible at drawing straight lines….The paper on the left is the initial idea for the quiver (not to scale) and the one on the right is the final pattern (to scale).

The Initial Design —-The Template —- The Final Pattern

Mrs. Elrod constructed the quiver out of the same material as the bracers. Unfortunately the diamond hole in the middle was abandoned as the seams ended up needing to be wider to support the stitching in the leather. Straps were attached, but something got miscommunicated from design to construction so the quiver ended up not being functional.

I still kept the quiver in the final photoshoot as it wouldn’t make much sense to have a bow and arrows for props but no quiver.