So, Lydia is wearing the same steel armor she starts with and with the exception of a steel horned helmet, she won't put on any other armor I trade into her inventory.

Weapons, she uses. But not armor.

Am I missing something?

Excellent question, I was wondering this myself... I look forward to an answer...

Lydia only wears Heavy Armor. I gave her a nice set of Ebony that I made and she put that right on.

Give her Orc armour or better and she will wear it.

Ahh, that makes sense.

Oh, perhaps that's my problem. I've only tried improved steel and dwarven armors so far. Maybe she hates dwarves.

I have gotten her to wear other heavy armors as well.

My question is...is there any way to get her to wear a sixy nightgown if i marry her??? Take off that damn armor!!!

Not without using console commands on the pc, or if you have pc wait until CK comes out and there will be mods to do this. Followers will only equip armor that has a higher armor rating than what they currently have equipped.
If you have pc you can use ~ (tilde) key and target follower, then type in removeallitems to get them undressed and wear something you give them, but they will respawn their base armor depending on what you do---i.e. fast travel, etc.

I gave Lydia full deadric + deadric battleaxe I've never had this problem you have encounter'd... Strangely odd.

I'm going to try what Sir Crashalot suggested and give her Orcish or better. We'll see.

The problem with giving her a full set of good Heavy armor is that she then can't carry anything for you (see is already overloaded).

when you are able to improve light armor to superior or flawless Lydia will wear any light armor that offers more protection then her default armor.

I can tell you that she looks fantastic in forsworn armor. Although she is still wearing steel gloves and boots.

It's a weight issue. What she carries, is tied to your weight class.

Yes, she loves Dwarven duds, but definitely prefers the Legendary Daedric outfit. Personally, I think she looks much better in the Daedric stuff over the bulkier Dwarven armor.

I had to enchant some stuff for myself to increase my carry weight to over 400 lbs. Then, I cleaned her inventory out of useless junk arrows, like iron and steel--and some Dragon bones I had forgotten about. After that, she readily tossed on the new stuff, which includes a Daedric Greatsword, Daedric Bow, and three 50 damage rated staffs. She seems to be a master with those staffs too--just stay out of the way.

Her inventory list will stayed grayed out until you resolve the weight issue. I was going to make her a Daedric helmet to match mine, but she's just too pretty of a wife to cover her head with that, so I gave her a high powered Archery Circlet that I had enchanted instead.

she looks pretty good in ancient nord armour too, but i had to use the console to make her wear it.

I believe you might be able to use better heavy armor for her to equip that. Then part ways, while she's wearing what you gave her pickpocket the starting items. After you remove her starting items have her follow you, trade back your items, and give her whatever you want her to wear.

I did this on Maurcio to have him wear Thalmor boots instead of default boots.

Here's a pic of Lydia, and yours truly, in our Daedric finery. (assuming the link works ok here) [img]http://magejubi.com/Skyrim/DressedToKill.jpg[/img]

Lydia will wear light armor. She's been sportin' the leather boots of Sneaking (I forget what exactly they're called) I gave her for a good while - though the rest of her armor is heavy.

do armor perks translate to followers? Example- if I take the light armor perk where it weighs nothing if it is a matched set, does she get that perk as well? thanks

There is a glitch with this that you can exploit if you so wish. When your companion reaches their maximum carry weight, they will not take any more items from you, However,...if you point at an object and tell them to pick it up they will continue to pick up more items. I was clearing out laborythian of all the dwarven metal, and was tired of fast traveling back and forth, so i took Lydia with me and clreared it in one trip. She had over 1200lbs. Cheating or not, decide for yourself, i was just trying to save myself busy work.

Don't worry fellas, when the Construction Kit is out it wont be long before you can dress her in a well armoured chainmail bikini top and thong.

I've got her wearing Forsworn armor. She looks pretty hot in it!

Assuming you are on PC and can use console commands, try these on her:
getav heavyarmor
getav lightarmor

You'll see she has higher heavyarmor skill which is why she prefers it. You'll probably also see how low her health is and seek out a better follower:
getav health

I'm on PS3. I wish I could do the same stuff you PC guys can do. Wish they could make some kind of mod kit for us console users.

I wish too, but, if I know anything about Sony, they tightly control their stuff and stuff for their stuff. Remember BetaMax? Sony only has themselves to blame for that one.

Lydia wears both heavy and light armor. However, the armor you give her needs to be better than her basic set. I tried to give her enchanted steel armor, that looked the same as her own armor, and she wouldn't put it on. The armor you give her needs to be of higher value. I had no issue putting her in full Steel Plate, Ebony, Glass or Dragon Scale.