Posted in Exploring, Fashion, Photography, Second Life

Velocipedestrienne

Apricot Paws at The Engine Room

Recently I bought a lovely vintage cycling outfit called “Velocipedestrienne” by Apricot Paws at The Engine Room event.

(Edit: Tipped off by my friend CC, who is demanding credit. LOL)

Initially I bought the white blouse for L$124 (fatpack was L$414), and the bloomers in burgundy also for L$124, and I also picked up the blouse in wine as a free gift at their mainstore.

However, afterwards I realised that I liked several colours of the bloomers, and contacted Zii Minotaur (the owner of Apricot Paws) and they were more than happy for me to buy the bloomers fatpack at L$414 and to refund me the L$124 that I had spent on the single pack, which was absolutely wonderful of them.

I also wanted some boots to go with the outfit, and I already owned Solvej by Ingenue in Noir, Oxblood, and Walnut, which had cost L$295 each, and I had written myself a notecard at the time saying that I had decided to buy single colours because the fatpack was L$1,500 (a breakeven of 5.02) and that the only other colour I could see myself wanting was Saddle. The Walnut looked too dark (although perhaps might have sufficed) and I thought that I did indeed need the Saddle so bought that.

I also wanted some hair to go with the outfit and, as luck would have it, the ideal hair was right there at The Engine Room

F191 by KMH

The hair was L$325 for the Natural pack. It is Rigged in two sizes, and also comes with three separate Unrigged bangs, and also the HUD allows 4 different style variants. I’m wearing Bangs2 in the pic, and Bangs3 is a wider version, whilst Bangs1 is a straight fringe.

So, with the outfit all done, it was time to look for location and a bicycle.

My first idea was to find a nice sim which had free bicycle rezzers, and the first place I found was Calas Galadhon Park. Whilst it is a lovely sim I wasn’t happy with the sizing of the bicycle (it came in fixed sizes, and I was between sizes) nor was I happy how totally uncontrollable the vehicle-based bicycle was, with it being way too oversensitive.

Taken at Calas Galadhon Park

The picture was fair, and frankly I could have left it there, but I went looking further.

The next place I found was a delightful bicycle-themed cafe called Java Sprockets which has a vendor board giving free “Java Cruiser” ladies bikes.

Java Sprockets

For a freebie, this was actually pretty nice. You rezz it, and then it automatically attaches to you. It rides fairly well, but has fairly poor anims. It has a script which allows you to recolour with a choice of “Cherry Red”, “Lemon Yellow”, “New SL Blue”, “Coffee”, and “Old SL Green”. It also allows for resizing.

With hindsight, a few mins with AnyPose would have come up with a half-decent pose (this is what I managed in 30 secs).

Java Cruiser

Finally I bought the Sonoma bicycle by {what next}, which actually turns out to be who makes the rezzer that I found at Cala Galadhon, only this version you wear as an attachment and it acts like an AO, meaning you can ride it anywhere. It sells for L$249 for a single colour, but I noticed that it is copy-mod so I bought it in Cream and then retextured it to a lovely Bugatti Blue and also made the flowers in the basket transparent because I felt it suited the type of picture I wanted to take rather better.

Where to go for a backdrop? My first thought was the Paris 1900 sim, even though the bicycle is more of a 1950’s style, although I would say the outfit is much earlier. I chose the famous Moulin Rouge as the backdrop.

Taken at Paris 1900

I sent the pic to my sis, Karen, who I know loves that sim, and she suggested that I might like to try Soul2Soul River, which is a gorgeous quintessentially English village, and it was a good suggestion.

 

Final picture, as published to Flickr

This is the picture I finally settled on because I had to stop somewhere.

 


Summary:

Outfit: Velocipedestrienne by Apricot Paws (at The Engine Room event)
Boots: Solvej by Ingenue
Hair: F191 by KMH (at The Engine Room event)
Bicycle: Sonoma bicycle by {what next}

Posted in Fashion, Second Life

ANIKA by Utopia Design

The shoes and boots by Utopia Design generally fall into two categories; those which have ridiculous platform soles and those that I absolutely love and generally buy without question.

These boots have been available exclusively at Uber for the past month and are now, as of today (22-Nov-2021), available in the mainstore.

For some reason I missed them at Uber.

Anyway, this seemed like a ‘no question’ purchase.

Continue reading “ANIKA by Utopia Design”

Posted in Exploring, General, Opinion, Second Life

The impact of Marketplace on in-world stores

There’s been some chat in the blogosphere recently that the Marketplace is killing actual in-world stores; that reduced footfall means that satellite stores (or even main stores) are less commercially viable than they were, and that this will have knock-on effects for malls, clubs and RP sims as they struggle to fill the vendor booths whose income helps pay their tier. I can see the argument for this and it is pretty compelling.
However, the counter-argument is that malls are a bit of a blight anyway and that the Marketplace is just so much more convenient, quick and efficient. And, again, that has some validity too.

My own opinion is somewhere in between. Personally, I absolutely adore shopping in-world if the store is interesting, well laid out, and gives me a positive ‘experience’. By contrast, there are few things more soul-destroying than wandering round a huge faceless store that has all the visual interest of a level of Wolfenstein 3D and where you can’t find what you’re looking for.

Here’s a case in point…

Could this shop be any more boring and uninspiring? This kind of shop, where the Designer clearly does not give a flying fig about the store, is the kind of thing the Marketplace was made for. They just want to sell their stuff and no more. May as well put it up on Marketplace and save yourself the tier.

By contrast, other Designers clearly love to build as well as make clothes, and pour a great deal of love into the whole shopping experience.


My greatest concern with Marketplace is that it will cause all in-world shops to become unviable and we will lose the experience of shopping at beautiful sims like this. Likewise, wonderful themed and/or RP sims where it is a delight to explore will also start to struggle to pay their tier to the point where they can’t continue. And I think Second Life would be a much poorer place for it.

Links:

http://strawberrysingh.com/2012/05/16/the-marketplace-debate/
http://primperfectblog.wordpress.com/2011/11/06/is-the-marketplace-killing-the-mall/