Sometimes less is more

As any man will tell you, sometimes wearing less, to them, is more. On these occasions when you body is bedecked with the bare minimum, you want that 2 ozs of cloth to work harder per oz then any other fabric you own. Well PixelFashion has the outfit that will deliver…and deliver…and deliver. This gorgeous piece of lingerie is one of the best I’ve seen, and continues to be my favourite, time and again, never failing to leave the men drooling at my feet, and ladies, let’s be honest, that is the goal of lingerie. This is a magic concoction of lace and prim gold chains. It is only 270L each or 1,350 for a fat pack of all 6 colours. The detailing on it is amazing, right down to the patch of lace on the ankle of the stocking, which is why you are getting a side view on the first shot. I love how this outfit is designed to accentuate every curve you own, and create some you don’t.

The necklace and earring set is another one by Tekeli-li! that master magician of colour change jewelry. This set is called Morgana. It comes in 11 metal colours, 45 gem colours, 11 glow colours and changes in 4 sections for amazing options. You can get the necklace for 100L and the earrings for 85L but when the full 8 piece set is only 365L who wouldn’t go for that. The hair I’m wearing is called Cafe in the colour Chestnut from Analog Dog . Most of the hair’s from Analog Dog I have tried in the past have been way too “flexi”, too fly away, for me, but if that is the same for you, don’t let that stop you from trying Cafe. It’s perfect and it’s even a free hair. You can pick it up for 0L at the landmark I gave you, but once you try it on for a day or two, you’ll be back at the store wanting to buy some more colours, trust me on this one. This is one seriously beautiful hair do. It’s available in 4 different colour palettes for 350L each. Once you own those you can even buy some of the recolour huds that Analog Dog had for 0L and recolour your hair forever. Truly a great value. Unfortunately, when I went to look up the slurl for the shop I bought the shoes in, I could not find them anymore, but for those who might have them parked in your inventory, they are Baroque’s complicity shoes in turquoise.

The skin is my latest buy from Redgrave. A new Venus fat pack, in pale, this time I’m wearing the blue. As always they are 990L each or a cheap 2,990L for a fat pack. Starts to save my lindens for my next skin buy, not that I’m an addict or anything.

Who says poodle hair is a bad thing?

Have you ever seen one of those outfits that is just totally not you, but you love it anyway? This is
Kate Bosworth – Ethnic by Lemenia Indigo Designs . I”m not really into overly busy prints, and I’m definitely not a heavy scarf person. Cover the cleavage…Ummmm…why? Yet put all these things together in this really brightly coloured fabric, and somehow it’s an outfit that I can’t resist. It even comes with almost vinyl textured stockings and boots. The whole feel is very modern, eclectic, an international-fusion of styles that somehow works. The really really good new? Only 300L!

It’s based on an outfit that was worn by Kate Bosworth, but it’s based on that, and goes beyond it. Unlike a lot of celebrity based outfits you see in SL, this one isn’t an attempt at a recreation, it takes the idea and runs with it. Which I love, I like seeing a designer putting her own personality into a piece. If you stop by the store you can see the original outfit on the sign to judge for yourself.

Now, the question was, what could you possibly put with an outfit like that. I remembered a hair I saw a long time ago at Mau’s & Mej’s that is one of the neatest hairs I have ever seen, but I hadn’t found anything just right to put it with. It reminded me nothing more then 3 tail puffs off the poodle I had growing up, held together with some scarves. Yet somehow I mean that in a GOOD way. The puffs are always moving like they are being blown by a slight breeze or the movement of your head. The flexies in them are extremely well crafted to look so realistic yet not fly away or moving way too much like so many flexi hair that the hair just drives you nuts. Unfortunately when I arrived at the store and bought Zuna (only 145L for 2 colours of scarves, available black hair colour only) the scarves did not match the dress at all. But have no fear, having made a copy of the MODIFIABLE hair, I used a white texture to remove the pattern of the scarf, then used a easy little program called ColorPix to give me the red/yellow/blue numbers of one of the colours in the dress. I just went into the colour screen in the edit screen textures tab, entered those numbers, saved the colour, and then I had ribbons that matched the dress. I added a shine to the front ribbon when the whole result looked a little dull.

If I had it to do all over again, I would probably use a low shine on all of it, but just using it on the front ribbon was a good compromise, as it would have taken me 30 minutes to go back and move all the puffs of hair to redo it. It took a while, and really made me wish they had made the scarves colour change, but it was doable and well worth it to be able to wear a hair that I thought was a lot of fun and matched the playful spirit of the outfit.

I also wore another Redgrave skin, this time the tanned Venus skin in green (990L). Another beautiful skin from a talented designer! Talk about a glowing  stunning skin that set the perfect canvas upon which to show this outfit.  Who could ask for more?

Callie Appreciation Day

Today…May 21st is Callie Cline Appreciation Day for Bloggers…and since I have appreciated Callie’s designs and generosity almost since the beginning of my SL journey, I of course had to participate. I picked my favourite Callie Cline dress, “Ugly Duckling” from the runway series (333L). Having bought this dress almost 3/4 of a year ago, you would think it’s charms would have faded for me by now, but that is far from the case. I love it as much now as the first time I put it on. It’s timeless. Changes in styling and prims to sculpty, winlight, nothing has aged it like it does so much else in my inventory. This dress has a prim collar made from one of her famous rainbowas, there are actually two different options, a thin one and a fluffier one. I put on the fluffier one for this shoot. There is a shorter and a longer skirt…you see the longer here.

The true beauty in the gown is the feathers. The skirt and the rainbowa scarf are made of feathers, and they move and feel like feathers. I tried to take the photo of the skirt moving a bit, to give you a look just a bit at some of the feathers in motion, but it’s not really possible, as they move so organically. The dress draws the eye and keeps it and would be perfect on the dance floor or just walking across the room. It will make you feel not like an ugly duckling, but a swan. There…you knew I was going to say it…and I did.

With this gown I matched Chai skin Diablo in the skin tone nutmeg. I love Chia skins for their attention to detail and their amazing lips, the shape of them is astonishing. Everyone’s lips look great in Chai lips, even some of the worse skinny shapeless SL lips I’ve seen. Now marked down to 250L (Where was this price when I bought 10 of them at 1K each), they are a steal! Go steal one! The hair is an old free hair by Redlic that appears to no longer be available, but don’t let that stop you from visiting the store. They have a new free hair and there are lots of cute hairs there you are sure to love.

A Fountain of Shimmer

Say hello to Bronze Shimmer by Lemenia Indigo Designs , a beautiful gown with a glowing, shimmery sparkly that is indicative of a the subtle look of well done sequin texturing. Sometimes I think that sequins have to be the hardest thing to do right in SL, because 90% of the time they look horrible, very blobby and they don’t move or look anything like sequins do on a real life gown. That is not the case with Bronze Shimmer. It defies the odds and shows you why even with the failure rate the way it is, designers keep trying to bring this look to Second Life. Normally I don’t like short skirts under long transparent prim skirts, but in this case it works. This skirt looks almost like a bronze glistening fountain, and when your AO moves your hips, the skirt seem like it flows around you, shimmering fetchingly, giving small glances at long limbs.

To match up with this gown I have two pieces of jewelry from Tekeli-li! . Tekeli-li! I sometimes think earned that ! by turning everything everyone “knows” about colour change upside down. Everyone “knows” that items that our colour change never look quite right, always stand out and look kinda off in shade. The metal tones don’t really work in colour change items, and they always have a sort of neon look to the brights colours. Well that is other colour change stuff, Tekeli-li! defines what everyone “knows” about colour change to make colour change jewelry that works, and works well. The colours are solid, beautiful, the metals are true to colour. I coloured the jewelry here to be bronze metal with aqua stones to be a little bit of an accent to the gown, not to matchy matchy. Here I am wearing thier Tree of Life Necklace, which sells for just 70L. It comes scripted for 7 metal colours and 30 gem colours. For earrings I wore the Nephthys Earrings which are 85L and come scripted for 7 metal colours and 40 gem colours.

My skin is Vivian, pale in pastel blue. I think it the colouring in this skin gives a very soft touch to the outfit (990L) and you can’t beat the prices on Redgrave’s fatpacks at 2,990 for all 15 skins. For hair I went with ETD ’s Tiana in Dirty. You can find it in the updo’s section for 150L a package. I’m not normally big on going blonde, but this hair is pretty even in blond. It’s a great shape that flatters anyone and any outfit.

Slipping into something casual…

After all these great gowns it was time to give equal time to something casual, so my mind turned to Zaara , a long time favourite store of mine. Zaara presents modern fashion with a touch of India. She also has traditional Indian fashions that tempt one to go Bollywood with so many colours and textures that could make you drool. Can you tell that Indian clothing is a big weakness of mine? Ok, I confess, I’m guilty! This outfit is called Moksh, in the pink set. It costs only 190L for the whole outfit, including pants and the belt is on a jacket layer so it can be worn without and looks great that way as well.

For the jewelry I again went to Lucas Lameth Fashion Jewelry This necklace set is trimetal, and can also turn gold or silver with a script. It’s called Kahto Choker and Earring in Moonstone and it is just 229L. The hair I’m wearing is called Bille from Bewitched Hair . Warning, the hair itself comes with extremely blingy barettes, which I cleaned up permanently in less then 2 minutes using an antibling script, but you can’t beat the price on this clearance hair which is 100L for a fatpack. The antibling script is free and I’ll be happy to send it to anyone with a notecard on how to use it. The skin I’m wearing is a Ton Visage skin from Sin Skins..a line which is most unfortunately discontinued.

Addicting Things Come From Poppies

Lemania Indigo Designs has a dress that will make you as addicting as the drug from a poppy. It’s called Oriental Poppy and it’s part of the collection she designed earlier this year for the Relay For Life. It sells for 450L and includes the shoes and a hat…but this isn’t a normal hat..it’s a fluffy moving piece of art that mimics the center stamens of a poppy, turning you into the center of your own flower. When combined with the bright china reds of the dress, and the deep rich dark dusky purple of the fronds, it’s an eye catching colour combination.

The hardest part about wearing an intensely coloured dress is finding things to wear with it, but in this case it was a snap. My skin was a no brainer, nothing is more intense then Gala Skins for this dress I chose the Emerald make up in the Radiance skin tone (700L a skin). I love the match of the lipstick with the dress. For jewelry I had to look no further then Lucas Lameth Fashion Jewelry , there I found the fantastic Maya II necklace and earring set. This set is available in a rich carnelian/gold version that is perfect with this dress and at 229L it’s a steal. My hair is Monique by ETD but I was unable to find that anymore at the store. I suspect that it may show up in the discount room, there is a lot of the old styles there, but they are going out roughly in alphabetical order and the Mo’s were not out yet. I suspect that a lot of you have this hair in your inventory already from the last two ETD 30L sales. It’s a great updo, and it’s perfect for this hat..it stays out of the way of the fronds while still framing the face nicely.

Releasing Your Inner Marilyn

This beautiful retro dress called Sensual by Shouted Couture just makes you itch to pull out the blonde hair and let out your inner Marilyn…we all have one…even us die hard brunettes. The cut and texture is perfect for the jazz club or an intimate evening for two, it even has panties and garters for when it becomes very intimate. To help you recreate the perfect 50’s sex goddess look, Curl Up and Dye has the perfect hair, appropriately enough called Marilyn. I’m afraid the skin I’m wearing is no longer available, it’s an old Minnu Model Group Gift called Old Hollywood, that only us old timers have.

Pretty As A Peacock

 

Only Lemania Indigo can make a peacock dress with a texture and feel that outshines a peacock. This new dress from her French Farm collection, 1920’s Peacock..seen here the short version quickly became one of new favour dresses and it’s hard to peel it off of me. I’ve matched it with Curio Snood hair in blue black. I love this hair, it’s the ONLY hair to wear under hats. It’s smooth top means no hair popping out, and the lovely curl at the front and the bun low at the back adds interest to the hat.  I finished it off with my current favourite skin Redgrave – Vivian – Pale in smokey 2.  Got to love her fatpacks.

A little something sexy

 
For my first post I decided to go a little sexy…a little Leezu Baxter …For this photo I combined her Valerie Blouse in Lila with her Mia Corset in Black…a little caveat here…the only bad thing about the Valerie blouse is that it’s not modifable at all so you can’t shorten it…and it does stick down a bit below the side slit of the Mia corset….why oh why does EVERYTHING have to be no mod these days….The good news is that the Valarie blouse is so beautiful..the colours are so rich and luscious you are going to want them all. I did. I bought the fat pack, and I’m notoriously cheap. I can think of a million skirts and blouses in my inventory to use it with, without even blinking, with or without bras to make it “PG”. Ok, maybe not a million even with my inventory, but I bet I can make 1,000. I won’t say anything about the corset…really, the picture says it all. Bravo, Leezu!

The hair is a freebie from Boon with the charming name of NMR32, a bad name for one of the best short hairs in the game. Don’t forget to look around the store for other great hairs. The skin is of course Redgrave - Vivian – Pale. When you say Redgrave, what more needs or can be said?

To go with this sexy outfit, I picked a pair of sexy boots, not in your face with a billion buckles and spikes but understated with strapping wrapped around your legs and thighs, and subtle little details like a couple of inches of lacing at the top back and fantastic white stitching on the edging of the wrapping. These boots are from Zhao and are called Trinity and come in mid thigh and knee length varieties..and are probably my favourite boots.