• Functional snow gear

• EVA foam fabrication

• accurate paint schemes

January 2017

This suit is modeled after the Rebel pilot uniforms in the original trilogy of Star Wars. More specifically, As the rebels escape Hoth in Empire Strikes Back. I had always had a vision of Luke snowboarding away from a crash on the snowy planet back to the icy rebel base. This vision inspired me to create a functional ski suit that I could take down the hill sporting the iconic look of a rebellion pilot.

The key to this costume was patience. Of course I could’ve easily sewn my own orange jacket and pants along with the other pieces. I also could’ve made an easier helmet in a few days. The goal for this one, was to build it upon functional snow gear, that way I wasn’t freezing or exposing materials to the elements that shouldn’t be there. The first piece I found were the snow pants. After that, I kept a watchful eye for a jacket to match the perfect shade of orange to the pants I had purchased. I searched snow shops, thrift stores, sports supply stores, online, goodwill, you name it… This took four and a half years. Remember when I said ‘patience?’ But my patience had certainly paid off. A suitable jacket finally presented itself and I started work on the rest of the costume.

The helmet was an existing snowboarding helmet built up with EVA foam, a high density foam similar to a yoga mat, and pieces of thermoplastic. These pieces were adhered with a contact cement that could bond to the plastic of the helmet, and surface of the foam (which has proven to be a difficult process in the past). It was painted with a rubber coating called Plasti-Dip and various other paint pens, spray paints, and brush paints. I also did a fair bit of weathering on the helmet to match the aesthetic seen in the films. I am fairly surprised with the overall look of the helmet, it is probably my favorite painted piece i’ve completed to date.

The rest of the parts were fabricated from various materials to give the correct look and feel of the costume. Whether they were sewn like the white flak vest, or EVA Foam parts like the grey chest box, most pieces were a combination of cheap items found in local stores or something I had laying around the house already.

Ive had great fun wearing this costume on various slopes here in Southern California. People decide they need to yell out what they think my costume is from and thankfully, most of them are related to Star Wars (though i’ve heard a few yell “Hey ghostbuster!” and “Look an astronaut!”). Once my post was popular enough to attract close to 40,000 upvotes on reddit, it was briefly featured on Nerdist and Adafruit blogs. Below you’ll find pictures taken during the build process along with some video taken while out in the snow. Please enjoy.

- Zach