New Year, New Gear!

With the holidays behind us, I have recognized a pattern in my kit’s evolution over the last few years. Although I always have several projects in the Work-In-Progress phase, it seems I like to set aside a bit of time around the New Year to create something special:

-This tradition apparently began in 2017, when I spent Inauguration Day weekend creating my authentic maple-root gaderffii, originally intended as a melee weapon for my Rebel-on-Sulon impression.
Since I’ve been phasing out that persona for a Rebel-on-Naboo alternative, the gaffi stick fits in better with a new persona for which I’m still working out the details. More info on that front coming soon! 😉

-At the end of that year, I got up early on New Year’s Eve and sat down with my sewing kit and leather scraps, with a mind to replace my multitool’s holster. I had been carrying my trusty Gerber for 18+ years at that point, so the original nylon was looking pretty rough. I tore it apart, drew up a pattern, and took a few hours to stitch up a suitable replacement (a multitool retool!), one much more in keeping with the Star Wars gear aesthetic:

-Most recently, I took a couple days over the winter holidays working in my crafting corner to create a replacement to my large belt pouch. This was a Soviet ammunition pouch originally designed to hold ten-round stripper clips for the SKS rifle, and was made of kirza leather (actually just pebble textured, rubber-impregnated canvas.) The material was pretty ingenious for meeting the needs of resource-strained wartime Russkies, and is plenty milsurp-y…just not exactly the GFFA style we know and love. (Although as recent material culture discoveries have brought to light, there ARE places for miscellaneous milsurp gear in the GFFA)
This pouch was the perfect size to hold my cell phone, so I’d been wearing it daily for the past two+ years in the classroom…and it was starting to show. Since kirza isn’t actual leather, oiling it doesn’t do anything to preserve it and keep it soft, so once the rubber starts wearing away, the bare canvas starts to fray and it just gets grungy looking (especially around the corners). So by the end of the semester I started thinking about replacing it with a box of proper leather, which I realized would also better match the established Star Wars aesthetic of repurposed WWI & WWII leather milsurp pouches.
I hit up the local independent leather shop to see what kind of cutoffs they had, and scored a large piece of fine, heavyduty, veg-tanned horse(!) leather. I made up a pattern, traced it out onto the leather, and proceeded to cut, bevel, punch, stab, and stitch up a lovely replacement ammo box.

(^What a difference oil makes!^)

Out with the old, in with the new! – quite the transformation from trashy to classy!

Just in the few weeks I’ve been wearing it daily this semester, the horse leather has begun to take on a wonderfully nuanced glow, especially as I oil and polish it on the weekends to help build up a respectable ‘used universe’ patina.
Bonus! With the leftovers from the horse leather, and after cannibalizing the old pouch and some cheapo Mosin-Nagant kirza pouches, I was able to make several additional pouches of the same pattern. These will eventually make their way to my Instagram shop, if you’re looking for an in-universe way to stash your phone/keys/wallet while trooping/cosplaying/etc.

What resolutions have YOU made to improve your gear in the coming year? Leave a comment below!

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