I recently stumbled on this video, a thoughtful discussion of the use of armor shaped to the female body, as frequently seen in anime and other fantasy works. The practicalities or impracticalities of such designs are of course interesting to me, since magical girls wear armor on occasion.
The topic, as the host acknowledges a few times, is perhaps over-generalized, since he is discussing a wide range of history with a lot of different armor designs. But it is an intelligent discussion nonetheless.
A few added notes on things the video mentions in passing but does not have the chance to discuss in depth:
- St. Joan of Arc, one of the few real women known to have worn armor, apparently did so for purely practical reasons. At her kangaroo trial, she was accused, among other things, of being a transvestite, but she in fact wore men’s clothing on the road and while imprisoned because it was a guard against potential rape. She wore armor on the battlefield for reasons even more obvious. These were understood at the time as acceptable reasons for a woman to dress as a man.
- I have been told, though am unable to confirm it from personal experience, that molding plate around each breast separately, as is popular in fantasy armor design for women, is impractical because it would inhibit normal movement of the arms. So although the video defends sculpted breasts on women’s armor plate, it might in fact be unrealistic—unless the breasts were sculpted on top of a cavity that allowed movement. That would, however, require a design very different from the body-hugging plate we typically see in fantasy art.
