Orange Is Hot This Summer And So Are SL’s Designers

While I was just away on holidays I saw orange everywhere when I went shopping for clothing. I love orange so this made me happy. I thought i would celebrate by bringing out one of my favourite orange dress from my SL closest and showing it off in my blog. This isn’t new but it’s better then new, it’s a dress I wear again and again. The dress is from Flame Fashion and is called Sequin Sexy Mini Dress, which pretty much says it all. It costs 299L and comes in 4 great colours. The rust that I’m wearing , gold, aqua and rose. The dress is mesh and comes in 5 sizes, it doesn’t say standard sizing but they are the usual standard sizes.  The store has a lot of nicely textured mesh outfits and there is a demo for everything.  Mesh items are great, but there is still enough flaws in them that I don’t like to spend more then 100L on something unless I try a demo first. Some things are just unwearable no matter how I change my shape.

The hair I’m wearing is from Truth, and is their mesh style Haven in Espresso. Mesh now has a variety pack. *Does a happy dance* I love Truth hair but rarely bought it because I change my look all the time and no matter what hair colour I bought, it would never been the pack I wanted for the outfit/skin combo I had. I generally only buy hair from shops with variety packs, it is what works for me.  Now that they have a variety pack, even if  it’s on the pricey side, I’ll be buying from them a lot more! The link above goes right to the hair like all my links go right to the item when possible. Truth has redone all their colours, they now have numbers not names, and there are 8 shade colour packs for 250L each, 1 variety pack for 400L and a fatpack for 1250. Pick up the new colour demo packs and hair bases. I swear I have more hair bases in my inventory them most men have total items.

Beautiful, that is the onlyway to describe this new skin from WoW Skins called Chanel. It was for sale last week at SL Fashion Week, but unfortunately between the time I took these photos and the time I wrote this up, I had a 3 day migraine and the skins she was offering switched. I am wearing Chanel in sunkissed in the Cleavage version. If you have missed Chanel, you still have a chance to get it. This skin will be a bonus in the fatpack when Chanel comes out in a few days.  If you want to try another Wow skin in the mean time, there is another skin out at SL Fashion Week which I am showing a picture of next…so stay tuned!

WoW Skins is great for a number of things, and one of the top is that the designer is a very hard working Lady who is always keeping up with trends in SL. She was among the first designers to come out with Tango and Lush appliers for her skins and and now she is at the forefront again in bringing out SLink hand and feet appliers with her skins.  About the only thing that she doesn’t include that I want is gloves with skin texture on the finger tip for prim nails. Those are so handy and prim nails are very popular from what I see walking around SL. If you aren’t in the WoW Skins in world group you need to fix that, she is a very generous shop owner and this is a group that you need to be in. The latest monthly skin gift even contains SLink Appliers. This store is very active, always having sales and new releases and the only way to keep up with all the happenings is to be in the group.

I dressed up Chanel a bit, it has a neutral lip, and I spiced it up with my new favourite set of lip tattoos. It’s The Skinnery’s Voluptous Lip Junkie Set. These are luscious luxurious, rich, shiny lipsticks that make your lips look like voluptous kissable pillows. You get 16 colours for 250L. A definate must buy. I want another pack so I can have more colours…not sure what colours I want because really these are all the colours I use…but I want more…I’m greedy.

The necklace I’m wearing is from Maxi Gossamer  from her Boho Series. It’s the Tarifa necklace which is a mesh necklace that comes in 14 different colours/colour combos on black cording. The necklace set comes with 2 long necklaces and 2 short necklaces and one which is a combo of both. There is also a earring and bracelet set that I didn’t use that matches that is only 199L. I love Maxi Gossamer, and have a ton of her stuff, she always makes such beautiful sets at reasonable prices.  I like that there is almost always necklaces to match her earrings, I hate buying earrings that don’t have necklaces to match.

This week’s Skin offering at SL Fashion Week from WoW Skins is the Erin Skin and Shape. I’m wearing the Milk tone of the Erin skin with my own shape above.  The Erin shape is lovely though, I’ve never seen a bad shape from Wow, and they have a demo of it and the skins for 1L. The skin comes in milk, tanned and sunkissed tones, each with regular and cleavage versions and the Erin shape. You can get each tone by itself for 150L or all 3 for 400L. Then you can accessorize! You can pick up the tango or the lush breast appliers for 50L each, includes all 3 tones. You can also buy the appliers for the SLink hand or feet appliers for all 3 skin shades for 100L each. You can get the parts you want, without paying for what you don’t want. It works! Whatever tone or appliers you pick you are going to love the soft gloss of the light pink lip, it’s subtle but strong at the same time, and the beautiful shading of the purple shadow. Let’s face it we can never have enough purple make ups!

One thing you will notice is that these appliers when you buy them are not labeled as appliers for Erin, that is because they fit all of the skins that have come from the talented hand of Swansen since Rosa. So you can try them with other skins you own from WoW Skins and see how they match. It’s great when items you buy are multipurpose and you don’t have to buy them again! Check out their blog linked on the side to trace back all their skins that have been released back to Rosa, you will see some lovely photos of some great skins.

The shoes and hands above are the best invention since sliced bread. I said after I tried tango breasts that someone should find a way to use appliers to add skin textures to shoes. Well it seems like Siddeon Munro was already on her way to making that a reality. They are part of the SLink Avatar Enhansement System that includes 15 different mesh hands and 2 women’s feet and 1 men’s foot.

If you haven’t looked into the Avatar Enhancement system yet and haven’t tried appliers before, what happens is that you buy the mesh feet and hands, you can either colour them like normal mesh feet and hands using the hud, or use the special enhanced versions and buy appliers (usually at little or low cost from your skin designer).  The appliers are just huds that you wear while you are also wearing the feet or hands that you want to texture. When you click on the hud it automatically applies the texture to the mesh so that they now match the skin seamlessly in most lightings. The feet and hands are still mesh and they will take colours slightly differently than your avatar does, so some lighting will muck up, to use a technical term, but most winlight settings that look great for your skin will look good with the applied textures.  At the end of the day in any lighting this will match better and easier then anything you have ever seen before.

With the hands you can also buy glove appliers from some vendors, and there are a TON of vendors selling appliers for both nail and toenail polish. I’m wearing a rust on both my fingernails and toenails from Orc Inc from thier Rich Darks Fatpack which gives you 50 colours for 550 L. I’m wearing my nails in the long size, but there are several sizes and even a clawed shape. Check out the SLink website for a list of vendors that are adding items for SLink, it’s growing all the time.

The SLink mesh feet are really special and have a world of possibilities. For us women there are two types out right now, the flat and the medium. You can wear these feet alone, the flat feet you walk, yes, flat on your feet with, the medium you walk on the balls of your feet. The flat feet have flat shoes, ballet slippers and flip flops, sandals..that kind of shoe as add ons. The medium feet have pumps and all kinds of sexy shoes like the ones worn above.   Once you have coloured your mesh feet, which takes 10 seconds, as it’s just wear the hud and click, you can change shoes with abandon. The shoes are just a single object in your inventory for each colour, which is sweet for those of us who have too much inventory, so it’s just a matter of right clicking on the colour and shoe you want and choosing wear. Boom. It’s on. Change your outfit or don’t like that shoe with that dress, right click and wear something else. Done…no recolouring needed.

The SLink system also lets designers make outfits with stockings and make appliers for the stockings. You can then use a separate hud to activate the stocking layer on your foot. Once you have applied the stocking applier, your stockings look the same colour all the way to your toes. No more seeing people walking around in stockings that cut off at their ankles

I’m wearing the Elegant 1 hand, which is one of 15 hands in the mesh series. You can buy them a number of different ways, at a variety of costs. However you buy them, if you are wearing the SLink group member title you earn 10% of the sale in store credit for use later.  You can buy single hands for 450L, one of 3 packs of 5 hands for 1,250 or the fatpack of all 15 hands for 2,250, which is definitely the most value for the money.

The shoes I’m wearing Lulu Shoes in Chocolate. You can buy Lulu’s for 450L each or a fatpack of 10 for 2,250. That is about the price of most of the shoes in the store. Some of the fatpacks vary in price depending on the number of shoes in them, but that is basically the level, so compared to a lot of the brands out there, they are a real deal for a very high quality shoe that is extremely easy to match and use.   Win, Win, Win, Win, Win!

The only warning I have for the SLink systems is something I have seen a lot of in both the SLink group and other groups. In my opinion the packages you get for the hands and feet are packed backwards. The hands and feet that are pre-unpacked are the hands and feet that you have to use a hud to colour. Just make a folder for them and label it Hud Tintable and put them aside for when you want to wear them with skins you need to hand tint with RBG matches like most items. Then unpack the boxes that are called Avatar Enhancement. These are the hands and feet that are tintable with appliers. It seems a little backwards that since this is your big selling feature you wouldn’t have these as the items people first get their hands on, but I’m not the designer, I’m sure she has her reasons. Also note that the mesh enhanced feet come with the stocking layer on, there is a little hud in the box for stockings, just put that on and turn them off, and you will be set to go. Other then this small problem, it’s a very simple item to us, if the applier version was packed in the open and the hud boxed, I’m sure everyone would have no problems at all.

The eyes I’m wearing are from Mayfly, and are her Deep Sky Olive Hazel Shadow..I did this close up to show you exactly how beautiful these eyes are and what depth of colour they have.  Mayfly has great prices for their eyes, you can buy the mesh eyes or the system eyes for 99L each. Every weekend they put 3 sets of eyes up for 60L each, so that is a great way to build your collection of eyes for every occasion. That is how I have gotten most of mine.  I do love a sale on great quality items.

The bracelet I’m wearing is from Earthstones, and is her Mosaic Cuff in Solar Flare. It’s a nice piece that matches well, and sells for 499L. It’s hard to tell the scale of something when you are just looking at a box with no photo of the item on. It matches like I thought it would but it’s a lot smaller and doesn’t have the impacted I hoped it would when I paid almost 500L for a bracelet, which for me is a lot for something like that. It’s an extremely well made piece, but if you look at the full length photo of me, it kinda just fades in because of it’s size.

Photography Credits

All the photos were taken on my Katink Photo Studio, using a texture from their Concrete set…number 7

The poses were from the Art Body Store’s Hand Bag Set, unfortunately the store no longer appears to be in business.

Sn@tch Makes Her Great Deals Even Better!

Murderdoll…aka Ivey Deschanel has taken her normally fantastic prices at Sn@tch and made them even better, with a 4 day 50% off sale that ends tonight. Sn@tch offers fantastic clothing with amazing detailed hand drawn textures at prices that would be great if you were getting one piece, but almost everything you buy at Sn@tch is a fatpack.  The dress I’m wearing above is no exception, it’s called Silk Goddess, and it comes in two colour packs, Pales and Goths. This dress is from the Goths pack. Along with this sleek silver number, you also get this dress in red, gold, black and purple.

Now we have all seen SL fashions that are recoloured from the SL colour picker, and look horrid, this is not the case with Sn@tch, each item looks like it is originally drawn in the colour it comes in. So perhaps it is more fair to say it comes in different coloured textures then just in different colours. I’m no designer so I don’t really know how to accurately describe the differences, but I know it when I see it, and this is colouring done right.

Here is a close up to see the wonderful shading done on this piece…from the small tiny wrinkles on the hip…to the ruffles around the neck…to the gem brooch at the bottom of the neckline.

You can get all 5 colours of this gown now for just 137L. Even double that when it’s not on sale is a steal.

This is one of my favourite outfits from Sn@tch, it’s called Murder Most Grave and it comes with 7 velvet shades of corsets and the black chiffon layered skirt. For added fun the posture collar is included.  All this is just 125L today during the 50% off sale.

I find this a fun combination of naughty and nice.

Sn@tch isn’t all about dresses though and here is a cute shorts and legging outfit called Farewell My Concubine. This outfit gives you 6 of these sexily belted jackets, in Army I’m wearing, plus Eggplant, Sand, Mushroom, Rose and Slate, these sexy brocade shorts and the black tights. This complete outfit, and so much more can be yours today for 137L.

Sn@tch has literally thousands of items, for all tastes in clothing, if you like it, it’s probably somewhere in the store. Don’t  forget to check out her mesh items and lingerie and accessories. There is also a special outfit you can fish up for free for everyone who likes 7 seas fishing.  So head on over and get a little (or a lot of Sn@tch today)

Photography Credits

Poses – Unfortunately the poses used were from a shut down shop, but the photos were taken using my Katink Photo Studo and their Autumn Splendor Background #5. Their background sets come 10 to a pack and are 100L. They have literally hundreds to choose from.

Credits for other items used

Silk Goddess 

Skin – Lara Hurley-Mia – smokey eyes/Tan – With Mia Golden Shadow Tattoo

Hair – Truth – Leesa – Sandlewood

Lashes – LeLutka – 2011 Lashes – Curl

Eyes – Aphotic Gloom – Clarius Special Edition # 3 – Jordan

Shoes – SLink – Aveela Stiletto –  Black

Murder Most Grave

Skin – Lara Hurley – Mia – Tan – Purple and the Mia dark eyeliner

Hair – Elikatira – Again – Brown 08

Lashes – Leutka – 2011 Lashes – Curl

Eyes – (amper) – platinum slur – No longer for sale

Farewell My Concubine

Skin – Glam Affair – Giselle – Light Kajira D – Special Edition Skin but line still available

Hair – Calico Ingmann Creations – Eleanor 1 – Auburn

Lashes – LeLutka – 2011 Lashes – Curl

Eyes – Aphotic Gloom – Clarius Special Edition # 3 – Jordan

Shoes – Nardcotix Mana Breeze Stilettos – Black

Filthy Comes Out Beautiful

It’s somewhat ironic that some of the loveliest skins in the game come from a shop called Filthy. It’s no surprise to those in her group that some of them are also her group gifts, as the designer behind this beautiful skin machine, Alexandra Barcelos, is as generous as she is talented.

Her latest creation is called Jolie, and she comes in 6 skin tones from Fair to Espresso, and is sold only in fatpacks of 8 skins for 1,800 lindens. With skin this nice and prices like that, why wouldn’t you want the fatpack. I never understood buying one skin for 1,000 lindens in a shop when you could get fatpacks for not much more. But I am a little skin piglet.

As you can see from the front and back body shots above, Jolie has lovely shading, not too muscular, not too shapeless, just right. I love her belly button and the very light scattering of moles. This is taken with my shape, which I always  do skins with, but the last photo I’m going to give you is with the Jolie shape which is included in the skin pack. The shape is lovely, and is modifiable, which every shape needs to be. It makes a skin pack which is already a good deal into a great deal.  There is also tattoo and underwear versions of cleavage add ons, I didn’t wear this in the shots as this type of swim suit looks terrible with them, but it’s great to have the options.

Makeup 1

Makeup 2

Makeup 3

Makeup 4

Makeup 5

Makeup 6

Makeup 7

Makeup 8

I love the make up palette, a nice variety of shade and make ups.

If you want to add some extra variety to it, there is a 1L lip gloss pack that she is giving away in her group gifts section as well as a package of tattoo lashes, blushes, eyeliners, lipglosses and lipliners that she is giving free to group members.  Group membership is 199L and she has never missed giving out a new skin for boys and girls each month that I have seen.

Last but not at all least is the Jolie shape. This is definitely a cute shape, the only thing I don’t love about it is the upper lip being bigger then the bottom lip. That has always been something that creeps me out. I always shudder watching Liv Tylor in movies because of it, but millions think she is stunning so I’m obviously a minority on that one. Well we all have our foibles, and I realize I’m weird on this one.

The hair is from the ever talented Truth Hawks at his shop Truth, SL’s first name in hair and is called Jean. I’m wearing it in Auburn from the gingers pack. I love this one, not too long, not too short, a little sporty, but clean enough to be elegant. This one is definitely a home run. I expect I’ll be tempted to wear this one with a lot of things. The colour packs are 250L each or you can buy the whole kit an caboodle for 1,500L.

The great swim suit is from Izzie’s. She makes everything look fantastic.  Most of the time when I put something on the first thing I do is check the shoulders to see how bad the shoulder connection is on the outfit. Her stuff is so well made I stopped checking. Too bad you can’t say that for everyone. Sometimes I think half the popularity of long hair with bloggers is to hide crappy shoulders. This great bikini is part of a big set that she came out with, that has all the colours and patterns anyone could ever hope for.  This one is her floral in cyan. You get it in a pack of 3 floral bikinis for only 220L.  You can also buy it in a fatpack of all her patterned bikinis for 889L, and I believe the count is 15 bikinis.  You definately can’t wear all them out, even in SL’s eternal summer.

The poses I used are from Lauria’s  The Sweetest Thing pack. Lauria is moving away from her old poses into more high fashion oriented poses so if you want to pick  up this cute and versitile pose pack in world, you had better do it soon, or you will only find it on the marketplace some day! It’s currently selling for 250L

Front –  Pose 2

Back – Pose 3

Face – Pose 5

Jolie Shape – Pose 6

Loving Lulu

I discovered this new skin by Style By Kira just before I came down with my acute broncitus, and it’s been one thing I have been dying to get back to blog, and now I have finally done it! When it is something this pretty, you don’t want to do a half assed job of it.

One of the most frustrating things about Kira’s work is that if you love a skin style, you have to wait weeks to get more of it, and you just get a couple of pieces in a week, then you have to wait some more. You get your obscession in bits and dribbles. Not so with Lulu. She has made a whole collection so for those of us who love this skin, and I’m sure you will, I know it’s now my new favourite, you have a whole bunch to play with, right from the start!

She has also lowered her standard already low prices, instead of being 600L per skin, these are 400L per skin for the classic make ups and 150L per skin for the fantasy make ups.  You can also get all the classic make up skins – A to J in a fatpack of 10 skins for 2,400L. Almost 50% off.  You can get the matching A to J fantasty skin fatpack for 950L, an incrediable deal, or you can get the whole set fatpack, all 20 skins plus the Lulu shape for 3250L. Other then the shape I made when I came into SL on the first day, Kira’s shapes are the only ones I’ll wear, so it is worth trying the demo of the Lulu shape, she is truely a great shape maker.

I love the shading in the front and back of the body on Lulu. It’s not too much, not too little, it’s just right. It should come with a 3 bears sticker on the heel or something.

To show this great skin off, I picked Blacklace’s gorgeous Kimiko Orange Thai Silk Bra Set, sexy, silky, lush, striking, everything you want next to your skin.  This transferable lingerie set comes with a plethora of layer options, that make you feel pampered and seen to. I seriously can not think of one layer combination you could possibly need that is not in this folder, I couldn’t have thought up half of them to be honest.  The prim pieces are cute and well placed. Ribbons on the front of the garter straps and a wire clasp at the back of the garter belt to name just a couple of them. You’ll have to search for the rest yourself. Adult hide and seek.  The set comes in 7 colours, but who can say no to Orange. I mean, it’s orange. *huggles the orange* For those of you who are less in love with the russets then I am, there is Purple, Pink, Silver, Green, Red and Blue. It can all be yours for 298L a colour or 1,299L for the fat pack.

Now for what you have all been waiting for, a peek at the great Lulu make ups.  This is 01A Classic and Fantasy

01B Classic and Fantasy

01C Classic and Fantasy

01D – Classic and Fantasy – I adore these both….

01E – Classic and Fantasy

01F – Classic and Fantasy – Fantastic Colours On Theses…

01G – Classic and Fantasy – Wild and Sexy

01H – Classic and Fantasy – One of the best sexy scary make ups I have ever seen.

01I – Classic and Fantasy – I adore the scrollwork branches on this one, dying to use it for something great!

01J – Classic and Fantasy – What can you say about this one, it’s just great… possibilities endless

01K – Classic and Fantasy – This isn’t part of the big set, but can be found a little bit down the wall, same price as the individual skins.  Perfect skin for spring or summer, or just to make you feel like spring or summer.

01L and 01M – 2 Classic make ups, both found with the extra Lulu’s…because extra Lulu’s are a good thing.

The hair I’m wearing help this skin look so good is Truth’s Francesca, one of his gorgeous curly hairs from the long hair section. I wore the Caramel colour from the Dark Brown Pack.  All the packs are 250L each or 1500L for the buy it all pack.  This hair comes with a ton of options that let you have it your way. First you can put it on in one piece like I have, or have a top and bottom separate, to keep the hair more in place as you move.  It also comes with a streak option, that lets you put a streak of any of Truth’s colour in the hair, to give it a highlight you want, in anything from a lighter or darker shade of brown, to purple or white…the sky is the limit for colour options with this fun option.

Poses – All the poses are from TeaSoup which is closing down and have all their poses on super sale. These are great poses, I managed to do this all out of one pose pack, which is something akin to a miracle! It shows how good and versatile their poses are.  Sorry to see you close, TeaSoup. The pose pack I used was Wait Another Day

Full Body Front – Forever Loving

Full Body Back – Simple and Clean

Face Shots – Tell Me Again

Grixdale Has A Sale That Is A Steal

Tyr Rozenblum the creative force behind Grixdale is working on a new set of skins. This is good news for us skin addicts for 2 reasons. 1 – We have more of her quality work to look forward to in the future and 2 – She has put her Teagan skin on clearance sale before removing it to make room for newer and presumably better things.

As you can see from above and from pictures to come, Teagan is plenty good enough to find a treasured place in anyones skin collection, Tyr is going to have to work extremely hard to top her. Not that I have moral objections to designers sweating to make me look better, on the contrary I’m very appreciative of their talents and efforts.

The bestest news of all? Yes, bestest is now officially a word in Tapika world.  Deal with it.  Grixdale has not just done your typical half off sale, or knocking it down to 25% of the price, or even 100L per skin nor even 50L per skin. You get all the skin in the Teagan line. All ELEVEN makeups for 400L each. You also get these skins in 2 brow colours, dimple and no dimple options and 2 cleavage options. Added all up that is 8 skin versions of each make up for a huge pack of 88 skins. But it doesn’t stop there. You also get two tattooed hair bases in blonde and brunette. You get 2 eyebrow options on bald wigs and last but certainly not least you get the Teagan shape which is really cute, and mod/copy which all good shapes should be.  Please note, all these photos are taken with my shape, something I do so that my regular readers have a basis to compare skins, but the last make up I have done in the Teagan shape.

As you can see, the Teagan body has lovely lines on it, not too overly shaded, not too muscular. Long and lean, and if your tastes fall that way, this is a good body for you. I am blogging the Caramel skin tone, which is about the middle, but there are darker and lighter all on sale. Demos are available so you can pick what is right for you.

This first makeup shows Teagan with the blonde eyebrows, dimple options and Cheer makeup while the second photo shows the blonde eyebrows again, no dimple option and the Cozy makeup.

From now on all the options shown will be brown eyebrows with no dimples –

Makeup 3 – Cozy 2    Makeup 4 – Faun

Makeup 5 – Faust   Makeup 6 – Firecracker

Makeup 7 – Gold Dust    Makeup 8 – Melon

Makeup 9 – Peacock    Makeup 10 – Plum (My favourite!)

This is me wearing the Teagan shape, wearing the Spirited makeup. Since this is Memorial weekend in the states, I’m giving a little salute to all the troops. Since I’m Canadian, I want to give a special moment of thought to the family of Bombardier Karl Manning who died on Friday in Afghanistan and to the family of all the other men and women who have given their lives on this mission. It takes a special person to risk their lives to bring freedom to strangers, and they make the world a better place.

The gorgeous lingerie I’m wearing is the Taste of SL sale piece of the weekend from Blacklace, it’s a delightful mixture of adult satin with lighthearted polka dots. Of course the sexy look it brings is all adult. You get a bevy of layers so you can wear this set however your heart or mood takes you, or hide it under another outfit for unveiling at the right moment.  It actually comes in 23 pieces, a couple of them tattoos, so your options really are over the top. You can tell the designer wears what she make, so they have thought of everything.  Guys! This is transferable, so you can give it as a gift, and women, you can hint for it as a gift too, because men are always helpless without hints. The price is only 99L as part of Taste of SL, so grab it while it’s a bargain!

The rich looking hair I’m wearing is Gwyneth by Truth, I’m wearing the chocolate, but all Truth’s tones are great. Each 250L hair pack gives you 6 shades, a streaked version, the version you see here and a separate upper and lower hair. If you love it and want the whole thing you can get all the colours for 1500L

Poses – The poses I used today are another special from Taste Of SL – They are from Izzie’s, and they are a set put out for the Memorial Day Taste Of SL, they are called Pin Up Poses and I love them.  They sell for just 120L for 12 great poses.

Front Shot – Pin Up 10,   Back Shot – Pin Up 09,   Face Shots – Pin Up 04,   Teagan Shape Shot – Pin Up 01

Tapika Roasting By An Open Fire

I live in the Canada, and sometimes it’s just nice to bask in the glow of a warm fire, especially wearing a nice warm sweater. This is feeling that the first foray into Lazy Sunday by Ibizarre evoked in me. Comfort, fun and just that touch of danger that any fire brings.

Ibizarre didn’t start off slow, they are offering both these pants, called Rock Baby Leggings and the sweater, called Black Cardigan, separately at 75L each.  I loved them both and snapped them up within minutes of getting the notice.  The only thing better then 1 Ibizarre item is 2 Ibizarre items!

Look, I found sexy shoes to match! The only thing better then 2 Ibizarre items is sexy shoes on sale! Vive9 has a whole collection of these sexy Xian v2 boots on sale. Unfortunately v2 refers to version 2 of the boot, not that it’s version 2 of SL compatiable with alphas instead of invis prims.  But the 50 l sale price tag makes up for that. You get 3 terrific version of the boot in each box. 

The only thing better then 2 sale items from Ibizarre and a sale boot is all that and a sale skin! This skin that is reflecting the firelight so beautifully is Style by Kira’s latest Elora skin 01C. It is on sale this weekend for 44L. You can’t beat that price for a skin this beautiful. Talk about spoiling yourself for a fireside snuggle.

My hair is a very old style from Truth, for those of you who have been around since the dark ages like me, look for Phoenix, the colour I’m wearing is hot chocolate.

Alert The Media – Closet Diva Turns Skater Chick!

I found this great outfit at Kiwi, this weekend, called Mercia. It comes in a whole fist full of bright shiny matched shades like the blue/pink one I picked.  What is even better is that it was a 60L weekend deal and as of tonight, Tuesday night, it’s still up for sale for 60L. What is not to love about a shop that has 4 day weekends! I don’t know what the price will be when the sale is over, but the store prices seem very reasonable, so I’m not worried that it will be unaffordable.

As you can see, despite it’s price the outfit has a lot of detailing, the folds in the top, the white stitching in the jeans. I love the wrinkled prim pieces on these knee length jean shorts/capris.

As you can see from this side shot, the pants are nicely low cut, but aren’t giving everyone plumber’s pants views of your derrière…want them or not. The top and pants look just as good from the rear as they do from the front.

First a word about the hair…This great hair is another great new release by Truth. This hair is called Gwyneth and I’m wearing it in a luscious shade called chocolate.  I like how nicely it frames the face…the small loose hairs that prevent the helmet head look, and the over the shoulder hair drape that manages to stay out of the breasts in all but the most twisted poses. Truth’s hair packs are 250L each, with about 6 shades in each, and matching streaked versions.  The fatpacks are 1500L.

This skin was hugely expensive. It cost me nothing…and it can cost you nothing to but a little searching time! It is the hunt prize for the Zombie Popcorn Hunt from Tik Tok, one of my favourite skin stores.  She is my favourite because she keeps making me look so good! To find the prize box easily I suggest you do what I did and look around in wire frame mode (ctrl-shift-r) because Miah is a tricky hider and it’s very well hidden! I cheated a bit though, and made the lipstick match the skin by wearing one of the lipstick tattoos I got in my new copy of Bony. That skin came with 5 lipstick tattoos, and 5 teeth showing lipstick tattoos, so while you are there grabbing the prize, grab a demo of Bony, because all the added extras  in it make it a great deal.

This is the skin as it comes for the hunt, without any tattoo layers.  I like this lipstick colour even more then the one that went better with the top. But I do love Tik Tok’s tattoos. They really let you individualize any skin for any outfit.

Sometimes you don’t need the fanciest shoes in the world. Sometimes a nicely textured, cute shoe is just the trick, and if the price is right all the better. Coy:ott has 7 different colours if these cute sneakers for sale at 10L a pair. You can’t beat that for value! Be sure to use the link above because the shop is almost impossible to find without it.

That’s it for now, have a great second life – Tapika Tomsen

What Is In A Name

What is in a name? Well a lot actually. The name of your shop will either attract people or – Heaven forbid – repel them. House of Hucci was one shop name that always repelled me.  I honestly couldn’t really tell you why. Perhaps because the word Hucci reminds me of Charo and her trademark phrase Cuchi-cuchi.  Perhaps because it sounded like a rip off on Gucci, and who need to go to a shop that openly declares their ideas are second hand? For whatever reason when I thought House of Hucci, I got visions of guys with tables selling low end stuff on street corners to the music from old Jerry Lewis telethons. Yeah, there are days it just doesn’t pay for me to turn on my brain when it gives me output like that. Obviously most people’s minds don’t work like mine, because this shop has been happily servicing the SL public since 2005.

House of Hucci had a 2 for 1 sale recently and I decided it was time to put my preconceptions aside and take a tp over and have a look around. I was pleasantly surprised to see quite a few things I liked. No tables with creepy guys selling rip off of purses, and no bizarre versions of today’s hit with a Charo twist on the speakers. I picked up the above one piece jump suit, Klymaxx (somehow that name does fit my preconceived notions though). It has all the layers and prim bottom legs and shoulders. Don’t wear more then one layer though or the detailing disappears into a matt black darkness.

Here is a close up of the top of the jumper. The diamonds are all prim pieces, not drawn on, which is nice detail work, that is missing from other designer charging a lot more then the 250L this outfit cost.  I was really attracted to the item in the store because of all the gathered detailing across the stomach.  The prim pieces fit really nicely and there was no colour matching problems at all. All in all, a great jump suit that I was complimented on more then once while I was taking these photos.

I love this skin, this is from a “new to me” shop, !Imabree, I discovered from the Black Friday skin sale. Unfortunately I found out  what they had on sale after I had bought everything else, so I didn’t have the money to pay full price on the fatpack and get half back. Lucky for the designer they weren’t on or they might have had an IM from me begging them to let me pay the half price directly to them. Yes..I would have lowered myself that much, these skins are that nice.  You should see the fantastic cheek colouring on the paler version of this skin, Rory. I highly suggest taking a look, it’s a highly original skin, that I think people will love.

This darker skin is obviously no slouch in the looks department, and it is a prize in the “With Love Hunt”. The actual name of this skin is “With Love From Brendon Papp” Brendon is the designer of these great skin lines at !Imabree. Like all “With Love Hunt” prizes, this one is 10L. If you can’t find it within a minute of tping to the landing spot for the store, smack yourself on the top of the head, close your eyes, and look again.

The hair is a new release by Truth Hawks of Truth is called Joey. Truth has started to sell hair with streaked versions. I used to think that I saw enough of streaked hair after my first year in SL when all the hair I wore was tipped or streaked some god awful shade like most newbies, before they grow out of it. This is streaked with a difference thought, streaked with class. It’s like jewelry with a subtle sparkle compared to bling. The streak is scripted so you can make it any colour you wish, so you can wear two completely different ends of the shade spectrum like I’m wearing, or pick 2 colours that are extreme close for a more subtle look.

I like this hair so much that just showing the front wasn’t good enough, so here is a picture from the side too.  I love how this hair is built, the layers of different lengths, each placed exactly right to cover completely and to leave no awkward spots in the hairdo. With a hairdo this complicated, that deserves major kudos. Usually with a design like this, it’s the fronts great, but the sides are a little funky…or the back doesn’t quite work…this hair looks great no matter what angle you look at it from. The sign of a designer that didn’t come into the business yesterday and has really learned from every hair he has made.

The bonus is, in case you haven’t bought a Truth hair since the streaks came out, that when you buy a colour pack, you get both the normal colours of that pack, and the streak colours in that colour range. 2 times the hair for the same price. He has 10 colour packs for 250L each, with for example with the browns pack you get 6 brown colours and then same 6 browns also in streaks. There is also a fatpack for 1500L

The short boots are from Kalnins but unfortunately even though they just came out this fall, they are no longer available. I had a photo to show you and everything! They are called Fall though, and if you are like me and smartly snagged them when they came out at 1/2 off, you should find safe and sound in your inventory waiting for you to rediscover them and show them off again.

This is a second dress from Hucci that I found and loved.  Called appropriately enough, Lace Dress this one in Woodbine, is a simple green sheath underdress covered by a black lace overdress. It has some nice realistic detailing like the lace is darker on the sides where a real dress would be where the lace is tripled for a seam.  It makes a very smart, sexy classic dress to wear anywhere for only 275L.

The skin is another skin I found through the Black Friday skin sale with the Skin Addiction Group. This skin is from Fashionably Dead and is her Dust number 4. I found her skin when seen all together on a big wall, the effect was to make them look a bit I don’t know, speckally, like art done an impressionist who only paints in dots of colour. I was intregued enough to try on a demo and then the skin captured me and made me buy it.  I’m sure this isn’t the best outfit to wear it with, but I wanted to show you it right away. I’m sure you will be seeing it again sometime with something more appropriate! The price of this beauty? Only 500L.

The hair in this picture is Milli by Analog Dog, it’s in the Straight Hair section under Medium Length hairs. It’s on sale right now, reduced to half off the normal prices, so it’s 150L a pack.  A great deal that you should get today.  This colour is in the dark pack, Brown Sugar. This hair is typical Analog Dog hair, it’s great. Just the right amount of movement, the texture is wonderful, it doesn’t disappear when you stand in front of half the things in SL.  Milli comes with bangs that you can wear or leave off, for 2 different looks.

The fantastic shoes pictured here are the Empress shoe from Kalnins. They produce some of the best prim toed shoes in SL and definately the greatest value for the money. They are all very high fashion and they are all TEXTURE CHANGE!.  They have some pre-set texture combinations to get you going, and to show you what sorts of great looks you can get with their system and then you are off and running. This isn’t a all brown shoe or an all green shoe. You can change different parts of the shoes to be different colours and the possible combinations are as they say, in the thousands.  Every shoe is one heck of a fatpack. The skin matching is easy, there is both RBG for those of us who like that…like me and there are preset tones with big square that show the colours a little whiter…a little redder…etc..etc..You can pick what you think your skin will look best as. Whatever way your mind works best, this shoe is an easy skin match.

So the price of these wonder shoes? 750L. Try getting a fatpack of any equal quality shoe for that.

A Dollarbie That Blew My Socks Off!

It wasn’t long after I got to Second Life that I learned that pictures lie. After tossing a few real life 20 dollar bills down the drain buying shoes, dresses etc etc that looked fantastic on the picture and like crap on me, I learned. It was not a fun lesson but I learned it. What I learned was to get a dollarbie or freebie from a designer first, see what their skill level was, and to judge from that if I should buy at a shop or not.

Soon I was getting a ton of dollarbies, I threw a 95%  of them out, but the 5% I kept, I went back to those shops and felt comfortable forking out 800L for a dress, because I knew they could design.

Some where along the line I noticed that even designers I knew that could design were making crappy dollarbies,  it was as if they didn’t think that people were going to look at those and think that that level of quality was what they were going to get from their expensive outfits as well. That never made sense to me. It was like making a demo hair that had purposeful flaws in it, chunks of hair sticking out all over, instead of just making it with weird colour streaks and a box over people’s head.

I found this beautiful dress this weekend from Badoura Designs, and it was enough to make me believe in quality samples of workmanship again!  I’ll definately be dragging my shopaholic friends to this store and letting them try on this beautiful dress called Zusy.  Once they do, I bet they go back for more!

I love the colour and texture of this dress, everything from the beads in the front to the wrinkles on the butt work perfectly. The prim piece comes in scripted or modifiable, but I just slapped it on and it worked first time without any adjustment which I consider to be an SL version of a miracle. No detail was left out. The banding where the beading is on almost seems thicker, the darting in the back where the dress is drawn in to make it fitted is there, the pleating at the front is life like.  I really have to applaud  Bardoura Loon for a job well done.

My shoes…my beautiful beautiful shoes. I love these shoes. If I had to pick I would probably pick these Hana shoes by Maitreya Gold as the most beautiful shoes in my inventory. They are 975 each or you can go like me, get a fat pack of 4 for 2,290.

The only fly in the ointment came when I got the box home and openned it up and put my beautiful shoes on. They have a “special” way of doing the colouring of skin, instead of the easy RBG method that everyone else uses that ensures a quick match in seconds, using a colour system build into the game mechanics, they have their own system that has 10 base colours and then you change the Hue, Saturation and Lightness. These buttons aren’t even press and hold so you can just quickly experiment with how everything works. If you want to go up to 75 in saturation, you have to press saturation 75 times.

They included a very limited list of skins that they had figured out the colours for, skin lines that keep the same tone across their whole line so it wasn’t a lot of work to do it for them. They didn’t do it for major make up houses like Lara Skin and Cup Cakes aren’t on it, and up and comers like Tik Tok are ignored. I have about 300 skins in my collection, the only skins I had on the list was Redgrave, and I’m pretty bored with wearing them.

I finally after 2 hours of playing “I’m an idiot pressing buttons”, I had to face the facts that it was toss the shoes in the trash and lose my 2,290L or go buy a skin from their list. I went to Atomic the first one on the list, and bought the skin I’m wearing here, which I figured was the lesser of 2 evils. If this had been a product from a real life shop I would have been taking it back and tossing those shoes in someone’s face and saying how dare they sell such crap.

Now this is not to say that that will be your experiance with the hud. You may like it. I’ve found one person who can use it, out of the dozens I’ve asked. She prefers it to the RBG version and doesn’t know how to do that. I’ve agreed to teach her. *grins* It’s just a friendly warning that if you are expecting RBG colour options like Stiletto Moody, SLink, Kalnins and so many more shoe stores offer. You aren’t going to find it.

One nice thing about the fat pack is that they come 2 ways in one box, one is 4 different shoes, and one is 4 colours as colour change in the same shoe, so you can set your skin colour once and just change the shoe colour when needed instead of clicking those buttons 70 times for each shoe. It’s a small advantage but I’ll take it.

Nothing in the world is all bad, and the experiance with my Maitreya shoes above isn’t either. By making me go out to buy a skin to wear them with, I discovered this gorgeous skin from Atomic. This particular skin was for a Stumblebum release so it is no longer available, but trust me when I say that if you go to the link for Atomic, you will find all kinds of beautiful skins from the same skin line, Audri, that will love just as much as this one!

The skins are 1,000L each or 2,000L for a 3 pack.

The hair is by Truth..and oldie but goodie.  For those of you who have been around forever like me you can check your inventories to see if you have Katherine. I’m wearing it in sable.

Help, Another Sweater Got Me!

You break a rule once, and you open the flood gates. I let one sweater into my inventory and now here comes another one too pretty to resist. Lestat Reuven has changed her shop name again, this time to Siss Boom, but her sense of style and her design ability hasn’t changed with the name change. This outfit, Moody Knit, is a great example. There are tons of small details I love in this, from the small button at the bottom of each jean cuff, to the satin crochet work at the top of the sweater.  It’s nice to have jeans that look new and crisp, almost all the jeans out there are all ripped and torn these days. That’s all fine but occasionally you want to look like you bought something new not like you’re someone’s poor cousin getting jeans 3 people have worn and tossed as being too old or that you picked the jeans up off the floor where you have been walking on them for a week

The Sweater can be worn with or without the torso prim, either way looks great! The cost is just 100L if you go before she comes out with a newer design, once she does that it goes up to the normal price.  This is one shop where it pays to check every day to see what is new.

The boots are byTruth,  their Foxley Boots. I just wore the bottom half of this tall boot, so it wouldn’t interfere with the bell bottom prim. They come in 4 colours and go for 250L each. The fat pack is 800L.  Now that winter is coming in SL, these boots need another look, they make great winter boot wear.  And of course they look completely different worn under prim pants as just clunky shoes.  They really do make a versatile pair of footwear.

The skin is a stupendous offering by Glam Affair, it’s their Eva skin in Winter that is being featured at The Dressing Room right now. It’s only 70L and as you can see it’s gorgeous! If you don’t get this skin, well you have no right to say your Momma didn’t raise no fools! Ok..well maybe it’s not that vital, but it is too good a deal to pass up.

The hair unfortunately appears to be no longer for sale. For those of you who might still have it in your inventory it’s from Exile, and it’s called Shay.  I love the spikey look of it and as you can tell by past entries, I love this type of hair style.  If you don’t have it, have no fear, Exile has plenty of other hairs which you can use to quell your sorrow.