Goofing Around with Armor

I'm a fan of the look of lamellar. I even made myself a cuirass using plastic plates.

I have has two issues with this cuirass, however,

1. It's a little heavier than I'd like. I want to shave off a couple of pounds.
2. It fastens on the side, which I find awkward.

I recently saw this video of a front-opening lamellar. I love it!

Anyway, that got me thinking of armor designs. I think I have a way to redo the plastic lamellar and save some weight. However, I've gone on a tangent and am thinking about doing a cuirass entirely of leather.

Anyway, I decided to try out my design in cardboard first.

The front

And the back.

Instead of individual plates, I'm using 12" long bands. I then scored them and, at top, curved them, so they look like lamellar plates. For this experiment, I tied the pieces together with twist ties and then used Velcro for the shoulder straps and the front fasteners.

It fits pretty well if I am just in a tunic. I need to make it a little wider to fit over my subarmalis. Also, the top jabs me in the throat when I bend over. I can remedy that by removing the bottom row. Still, I'm pretty happy about how it turned out.