Mirror Armor // Man of La Mancha

The Man of Mirrors, not very practical if you want to sneak up on someone, but cool none the less. This is another build for the school play Man of La Mancha, so I had to make the armor larger than I normally would to fit the actor who has not been cast but is presumably larger that 5' 2.75".

Any hoo, this build took about 5 hours to make, and cost about 35 dollars (only because I couldn't figure out how to make the mirror part, so I wasted a bunch of materials).

Step 1: Materials

- 1/4 inch eva foam

- 2mm black craft foam,

- Silver and black acrylic paint

- Silver poster board.

- A heat gun

- Contact cement

- Elmers glue

- Hot glue

Step 2: The Breast Plate

I started by making a pattern off of my mannequin. I make the pattern a little larger than it really was so it would fit the actor. I wanted the top of the breast plate to flare out a little bit, so I angled the top of the pattern (see pic two). I cut out the two pieces of foam and used contact cement to connect them together.

Step 3: Useless Part

So originally I wanted to make some designs on the armor, so I cut a strip of foam and glued it down the middle of the breast plate. I also put a triangle of foam over the flare part. This is a useless step because I covered it with mirror plates later on, so you can't even see this bit.

Step 4: Back Plate

I patterned the back plate off my mannequin, and did the same as I did with the breast plate, cut out foam, contact cement together. I also used my heat gun to curve the back plate. I used my heat gun to seal the breast and back plate by carefully heating the foam until it was shiny.

Step 5: Mirrors!

I started by sketching out the broken mirror design onto the back of the poster board. I would recommend taking a picture of the sketch so you can use it as a reference when gluing the mirror pieces to the armor. Mirrors are thick, so I decided I wanted the poster board to be glued to foam pieces (2mm black foam), but they needed to be the same size and shape as the poster board. I put two foam sheets onto a large cutting board, then I placed the poster board shiny side down onto the foam. I used an exacto knife to cutout the broken mirror pattern.

Next I used elmers glue to glue the poster board to the black foam. I didn't use hot glue because hot glue is bulky and would make the poster look lumpy. Pic 4 and 5 show the front and back of a piece of 'broken mirror'.

Step 6: Final Pieces!

I forgot to mention earlier, that I painted the breast and black plate silver after I heat sealed them.

I used hot glue to glue the mirror pieces to the breast plate using the picture I took earlier as a reference. I used the scraps of poster board I had left over to make a random design on the back plate.

I used a leather punch (you could also use a drill) to make holes in the shoulder and sides of the plates so I could tie them together.

Step 7: All Done!

And the piece is complete! Only 2 more play builds to go!

If you have any questions feel free to message me or comment below :)