Dragonscale Chainmaille

Alright boys and girls, your homemade chainmaille is subpar. I know that you wanted to make an awesome cosplay costume, but you kinda failed. If your chainmaille isn’t Dragonscale Chainmaille, then what’s the point of wearing it? Also, please forgive my archaic spelling of “maille,” I just can’t help myself.

Here’s a quick video on the weave and a list of the materials for Dragonscale Chainmaille.

Materials:

• Wire chain maille jump rings, silver plated: 18 ga/ID 5.95mm/4
• Wire chain maille jump rings, black: 20 ga/ID 3.57 mm/180pc (be creative with the smaller ring’s colors, though. If you use red or orange, it’ll look even more awesome.)
• Flat nose jewelry pliers (recommend Wubbers because they have cute itty bitty baby Wubbers which are ideal for chainmaillery).
• Chain nose jewelry pliers (baby ones)
• Large Beading Mats -12 x 18 Inch

 

Now that you’ve hopefully got the weave down, it’s time to figure out the patterns you can use for your next cosplay project.

Chainmaille shirt: the dragonscale weave is basically two European 4 in 1 weaves interwoven together. So, it’s possible to make a chainmaille shirt, seeing as the European 4 in 1 is the most popular chainmaille shirt to craft, but it would take a long time. So, if you’re new to chainmaille projects, do not start off with a shirt, you’ll get chainmaille burn-out faster than you can say, “this is gonna look awesome.” For the beginner, I suggest a chainmaille bracelet like in the video.

 

Here are some different styles to follow for a chainmaille shirt:

• T-Shirt Style: there are no seams. This is an easier style because the weave hangs in the same direction for the whole shirt; it is also the most common. The sleaves just hang open for this style so there’s no complicated fitting process for the arms.
• 45-degree sleeves: for this style, the weave hangs in the opposite direction only for the sleeves. It requires 4 seams: one at the back and one in front of the shoulders. This shirt is not as manueverable as the t-shirt style shirt, but does look a little more aesthetically pleasing.
• Mantle: this is a bit of strange style because you actually construct a shirt around an already constructed chainmaille mantle. There are more advanced connection types with this shirt: for experts only.

Keep these things in mind when you’re constructing your chainmaille shirt:

Shirt coverage: there are a few medieval terms for the different types of chainmaille shirts.

• A byrnie  is a chainmaille vest that goes right to the belt line. No sleeves.
• A haubergeon hangs to the mid-thigh and is normally the typical t-shirt style.
• A hauberk is a very low hanging chainmaille shirt that hangs between the knee and hip with long sleeves.