Otherworldly

The Palace of Tears is a stunning build that is part of this years Fantasy Faire. There are no vendors on this sim, but if you do the second part of the hunt, you will find yourself there. And even if you don’t do the hunt, do visit because it is a gorgeous build with some really haunting and creative decorations in the palace gardens.

From skin with the rough texture of stone to skin with the dark-grey colour of stone; with so many fantasy events going on, finding a good fantasy skin is not hard at all—the only hard part is choosing if you only want one. I was fortunate enough to get a chance to blog this particular skin for this round of We Love Role-Play, but though I opted to keep the whole look grey scale, I moved away from the traditional white hair of a drow.

Both the Fantasy Faire and Enchantment are still going strong so it is time for another little event cross-over. It seemed to me that the Enchantment releases from HopScotch and Lark would make a fine pairing with Alia Baroque’s RFL release for Fantasy Faire from Fallen Gods.

The Fantasy Faire has now been going on for a few days and many of you have probably had a chance to visit. If you are anything like me, you probably have favourite stores that you check out first. I even tend to go so far as to make a list of stores to visit for each sim, just to keep myself organised. But if you always head for the known quantities, how are you going to find those exciting new things? The “My New Shiny” Blogger Challenge is about encouraging bloggers—and everyone else—to branch out a bit. When I was on my browsing the sims during the blogger preview, I tried to do so with an eye towards finding something new that would catch my attention. That is how I came across Arx Loricatus. And when I needed an outfit to go with my fancy new sword, one of the review copies sent out seemed to fit particularly well. As it happened, it came from a brand that I’ve never blogged before either, 22769.

For the spring round of The Seasons Story the team behind aisling has created a three-part outfit (dress, shoes and headdress) and a matching swing with both single and couple poses. I thought these would pair perfectly with the stunning new house from Trompe Loeil, available at this month’s Collabor88. My hair is also from the Seasons Story and is created by Wasabi Pills.

In just two days, on the 14th, the Skin Fair opens. It is quite a massive affair this time around, with three whole sims full of skins and with each participating designer offering Skin Fair exclusives that won’t be in their stores until the fair is over. I have decided to start my coverage of the fair with the new Astrali line from The Plastik. The line itself was actually released in the new store today, but you will have to wait until the Skin Fair for 7 of the tones. The Plastik will also be offering a large set of striking eye makeups at the Fair as well as nail polishes for Slink’s hands and feet. But lets dive in and take a look at the lovely Astrali.

In the midst of a steady stream of new releases, the Plastik has moved to a new location, so that is where you will find—among other things—the striking Living Lights Horns. These highly detailed mesh horns have an incredibly range of customisation options, covering all of your…err…horny needs. ;)

February seems to be gearing up to be Fantasy month, with several events focused on fantasy and role-play wear running at the same time. One of these is the Fantasy Gatcha Carnival and even though I am not a big fan of gatchas (for photos/blogging it is really frustrating to not get the colour you want and it is even more frustrating to try and collect a whole set) there were some things there I just had to have. So far, I haven’t been very successful at sorting out those must-haves, but I did manage to score some complimentary colours of chanimations stunning Harpyia set.

On February 1st the 2nd round of Enchantment will be opening. This time the inspiration is Little Red Riding Hood. There will be red gowns, wolves and baskets, yes, but that is not all that the participating designers have been inspired to create. Still, for my first post about the event, I simply had to feature the Blanchette gown in red from Miamai together with the Little Red medallion and ring from Bokeh.

Have I mentioned how much I like the skins from the Shops? Actually, I am pretty sure I have, but it bears repeating. Their faces (this is Pixie, which I already owned in a lighter tone but I ended up needing a somewhat darker one for some photos) really stand out from the jungle of similar-looking skins that are out there today and with the cleavage options now included with each skin the bodies have gotten even better. I absolutely adore the natural cleavage since it works so well with smaller breast sizes and in total there’s six cleavage options, counting the default that is on the skin itself.

Trompe Loeil’s first release of the year is the Dragon & Orchid Home Pub for FaMESHed. It comes in a PG and an Adult version (no, the difference isn’t that the PG version only serves soda) and as usual I went with the latter. And then I had the idea of using the Ice Queen’s Coat from Junbug and, well, very little else…

I couldn’t quite get out of the lovely Snow Queen skin from Jalwa just yet, so I added brows of a different colour (browless skins are so handy) and a lip tint to make it look a little less frosty and more suited for the gorgeous Thetis gown from Senzafine, another We Love Role-Play release. I thought it went really well together with the stunning Artifact set from Eclectica at the Jewelery and Accessories Expo.

Life has continued to be more hectic than I would prefer (especially in December!), but I have at least managed a bit of reading lately. One of the books was an ARC of Mark Smylie’s The Barrow, which is quite the old-fashioned Sword & Sorcery adventure. It was just the inspiration I needed to create a look from a couple of the new releases for this round of We Love Role-Play: Jalwa’s Snow Queen skin and ieQED’s antler pauldrons.

It is time for another round of Genre, this time with Steampunk in the focus. My immediate must-have item was this lovely Ada gown from Senzafine. It is available both with a black base and a brown base and I was sorely tempted by both. In the end, the Noir/Crimson version won out since it felt so lovely and gothic and just right for October. Once again, I am quite impressed by the lush and detailed texturing from Senzafine and I love the little red accents against the black.

The lovely Foxxe eye makeup is one of the Plastik’s releases for the Body Modification Expo. I think it really transforms the eye area of my Siobhan skin from Adam n Eve, creating a very different look.

A little less writing with this entry than usual, as my right arm is objecting a touch after doing a bit of sweeping in the yard. But I think the pictures of the elegant Morgana gown from the Plastik do a fine job of speaking for themselves.