One of the stores catering to historical garb and fantasy wear that I remember visiting early on in my Second Life was Silver Rose Designs, and a few outfits from the store made it onto my list of things to buy when I had the funds to do so. As it happened, I didn’t actually buy any of those outfits, even when I did come into sufficient funds. I believe most of them were older, non-flexi designs, which probably was what led me to deciding against getting them after all. However, the store stuck in my mind as I had liked what I had seen of her designs. A little while ago, my attention was once again drawn to the store, as I spotted a very appealing Arabic-inspired outfit on one of the blog feeds. This turned out to be the first in a line of such outfits from Silver Rose Designs, a departure from the Victorian outfits that appear to be her main focus.
Skin: Ahawi No Makeup by Skin Within
Hair: Delphinium (retextured) by Calla
Outfit: Fatima Crimson by Silver Rose Designs
The outfit is called Fatima, and it is a welcome change from the silks and belly dancing outfits that make up the majority of the Middle Eastern/Arabian Nights-flavoured outfits that are available. The pattern along the neckline, the lovely cut-outs on the arms and the shawls about the waist and hips give it an alluring appearance with a distinctly exotic flair. I wouldn’t imagine its particularly accurate, but it is perfect for an oriental fantasy.
The colour palette of this dress is actually one reason I didn’t buy it as soon as I saw it, because blue is not one of my favourite colours. I kept wishing for black or something else for the shawl, but in the end I realized that this boldness was just what was right for this outfit. So, today I finally bought it, and I am very pleased with my purchase.
Its a very well-made, flattering outfit which shows good attention to details and skilled craftsmanship. The use of a system skirt and a prim skirt does mean that the blue strip in front doesn’t always line up perfectly (for example, if your stand keeps your legs a little too wide apart), but for the most part it looks very pretty.
The dress comes with top, system skirt, glitch pants and prim skirt (in two versions, one scripted for sitting, etc) as well as the headscarf seen here and a couple of veil options. I did not use these because they attached to the same point as my prim lashes and because this shape’s fairly large nose poked through the veil. They are, however, quite nicely done.
In addition to the Crimson that I picked up after much deliberating, there are five other colours, of which I found the Black and the Sand quite tempting as well.
And while I’ve got a close-up to write about, I can’t help but to mention the gorgeous Ahawi skin from Skin Within again. I love how exotic and fierce it looks. I definitely need to get a few of the makeups for this skin, so I can make use of it not just with period- and fantasy-wear which is when I tend to go for the no makeup option.
In addition to the Fatima outfit, there is currently one other gown in the ‘Kingdom of Heaven’-line, Bashai’r. It looks like it has a very pretty fabric texture and the colour-combinations are quite tempting, though I am not quite sure about the cut-outs on each hip. However, I suspect it may end up in my inventory sooner or later. Possibly I may have to get one of her period-gowns first, since the palette she uses is one you don’t see from a lot of other designers. Silver Rose Designs is definitely one of those great producers of period- and fantasy-wear that gets far too little attention on the blogs. Sure, its not precisely ‘fashion’, but costumes are important to quite a few people in SL and many such outfits are made by very talented creators who deserve a lot more attention.
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