New Look vs. Old Look

[Osceola Bill]

I kinda agree with you friend, especially since making or buying stuff that is correct for the period is not near as cheap as we would like. My rifle has a few scratches and is on its second barrel now. It still will clean up good and some of the brass furniture will actually shine. I still don't have enough regalia to be complete as many do. Some of it looks bad from use, but not abuse. I am proud for you that you are equipped so, don't worry age gets to us all. Man I would like a trade musket can't afford to buy one so let us find out "on the cheap" how to build one. Turkey season here in Florida now does not allow muzzleloading rifles to be used so I will have to adapt! You just go to that rondy with your new and correct stuff and have a big old time! If ya see a smoothbore barrel blank report on the price!

[texasranger]

I think some old, some new mixed is the way to go. somethings might need to be aged a bit just for the fact that we don't do this every day and it can take a long time for some items to age properly for the look you want. Clothes always usually start off new but they age quickly.

[Mortblanc]

I have seen this discussion many times.

The real problem is that some of you guys are simply not going to enough events!  If you are out in the woods or around the campfire 15-20 weekends a year your gear will age, and when it wears out and you replace it you will never even think about the fact that it is new.

I have been doing reenactments for much of my life and some of my gear dates back to the Civil war centenial in the 60s.  A lot of my camp gear is left over from the bicentenial and most of my firearms are older than some of the adults posting here. 

Like me, they look old.  Oddly, the gear looks better cared for than I do.

[Swede]

My pard and I have this argument all the time (as if we need a topic of conversation over a bottle of Bulleit). He maintains, "they had new stuff at some point". I agree, however, the impression I'm working on is a true Hivernant - someone who's seen the elephant and spent some time trekking.  Most of my stuff got that way by using it and I'm too cheap to destroy my goods, but I've been known to patina my stuff in such a way to give it an interesting look. After years of re-enacting mountain man, Civil War and cowboy, I notice which folks get the attention and it ain't always the shavetails with pretty, shiny goods.

[woody]

I guess it's like the old saying..."It's all in the eye of the beholder" 

[William]

Haw!!!!

[Hanshi]

It is vital to avoid used ball and used powder and this does not help a persona .  If you use "used" ball it needs to be melted back down then I guess it would be acceptable.  Used powder is not even PC/HC .  Used chewing tobacco is okay; my granddaddy would chew his tobacco twice and then smoke it.

[hrayton]

Wow, back to this again? Cool! I think I asked this question prior to actually heading out on my first one a couple years ago. I think I setled on the answer someone gave me there..."Clean enough to be healthy, and dirty enough to be happy." Weapons and survival gear used but not abused, and I think the rest would be as new as could be afforded, depending on the persona, shirts, pants, etc. What prompted the original question was that everything that seemed to be for sale already looked like it had been through the F&I War, The Revolutionary War, The Lewis and Clark Expedition, there and back, and finally the War of 1812, before it was put up on ebay, and I think I was worried about thread counters too, with their overabundance of opinion and "common sense". A 1750's persona, carrying a 1750's musket, that looked 200 years old already for example......oh well, decided to do my own thing and feel good about it. A lot of these folks here helped as well, and that summer got me into a lifestyle that I really enjoy now. THANKS TMC!!!

[dusty hill]

i just spent the coldest winter in 20 yrs wading in icy streams and lakes setting traps, skinnin my catch,
scrapin and packin hides. i fought bear and cougar to keep my cach, slept cold with no fire for a week in indian country gittin to this rondy and ifn your stuff ain't brand spankn new and pertyer than a speckled puppy we ain't tradin  NUFF SAID

[Mortblanc]

I had a friend that was a real stickler for keeping his gear pretty and he always looked like he had just bought is kit and walked out of Walmart.  There are some folks that are going to look "farby" in anything they wear.

We also have differences in the folks here that "do rondys" and the ones that go to juried events.  Chrome tanned leather is a status symbol at one place and not even allowed at another.    

Personally, I try not to use more than one "new" piece in any outfit, except for my dressup clothes.  You can always tell a dedicated reenactor because his best clothes belong in the 18th century.  I paid more for my pants, shirt shoes and weskit than I did for the suit I wore to my son's wedding!

Even in civilization most people looked well worn as they went about their business.

By law masters were only required to provide apprentaces with one new pair of pants and two shirts each year.  Runaway reward postings normally discribe the clothing worn by those sought and the clothing was usually well worn and hand-me-down.  When the runaway had new clothing it was always a point of identification.

Town people and professionals turned their cuffs and hemmed and mended garmets untill they were useless.   Women commonly recut dresses into different styles and "cut down" clothes to fit growing daughters.    

On the farm, cloth had to be grown, spun, woven, cut and hand sewn into every garmet for every family member.  That probably ment that new clothes were a special event, at least before factory cloth came available.  

Even in my early years shoes were a once a year occurrance.

As far as camp equipment and accessories, it was all new once, but not for long!  By the time most of my stuff has been through two or three camps it blends in nicely.  That can be a problem, and take a while, if you anly camp once a year.  If you do a dozen camps a year you will develop a normally used look.    

[markinmi]

One of the recent issues of Muzzleloader has an Native american on horse back holding a musket aloft.It looks pretty close to the one I posted in the pic earlier in this thread,The trade silver is on the opposite side of the stock and its loaded with beads as well.Hmmmm I guess great minds think alike 

[beowulf]

been making , hunting bags , holsters ,knives ,and other assorted items for the last 34 years . and if a person makes the request I will age the item ....to a point ! make it look a year or two old , I`ve been asked a few times to make an item look like an original and my question was , why ?  one feller wanted to know if I could make a confederate d guard bowie . I told him sure no problem , then he wanted to know if I could make it look like a dug up relic ( thats when the bells started ringing ), told him I dont do fakes ! then checked him out , he`d been passing of reproductions as originals for quite some time !had also been arrested digging for relics on the gettysburg battlefield ! gotta be careful who you deal with ! and why would anyone want their equipment to actually look two hundred years old , it surely was`nt that old back then !

[Muley]

Since i'm brand new at this. My plan was to make my stuff, and how it looks is how it looks. It will get old naturally by me using it. That will be the fun part.

[Hawken50]

  Muley yas got the right idea to my way of thinkin.

[Hanshi]

  Exactly!  I do that as well and would hazard a guess that most of us do.