blackhorse custom armour, leather goods, weapons handmade kids

:: Welcome to the Blackhorse Armoury ::

Strathmore man uses ancient armor skills to
teach life lessons
(courtesy Visalia TImes Delta, Visalia, Ca)

Chivalry is not dead. At least not at a little
shop in Strathmore where Bart Remling and
his squires tirelessly labor every day to live the
life of Renaissance-era knights.
“This is a way of life. We don’t just do this
occasionally. We live, eat and breathe armor,”
Remling said.

Even the simplest pieces in his shop take
hours of work, and an entire suit of armor
could take up to three years to complete
properly. Remling learned the art of armor
making after pleading with a Central Coast
armor maker to teach him.

“A lot of the guys are very protective of their
armor-making secrets,” he said.
Now, he sells his work at Renaissance festivals
around the state through his vendor name,
Blackhorse Goods.
But his real calling is to pass on the art to
others who are willing to learn.

It’s much more than just pounding metal into
shapes or bending it into chain mail.

The real art is being a knight, and living by a
moral code that has been long forgotten by
today’s society, Remling said.

“We’re trying to live up to the ideas of a long
time ago, the morals we don’t see in today’s
culture: the honor, the integrity, the honesty,”
he said.

It is those morals that Remling and those in his
troupe took to Camp Country Jamboree this
past year.

Held every year in Springville, the camp is a
place for children ages 5-14 who have cancer,
as well as their siblings.

David Prestage, camp director, said what
Remling brought to the camp was impressive.

“The knights, of course, are very exciting with
their swords and the jousting and all that, but
what I was interested in was the kids getting
beyond that,” Prestage said.
“The code of honor, the chivalry, the kinds of
things that a lot of times our society doesn’t
get to inculcate into children these days.”

While Remling’s experience with what he calls
the “old guard” started more than two decades
ago, it has recently turned into more. Along
with helping at Camp Country Jamboree, he’s
started to help mentor at-risk or disabled
children through his work.

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