Otherworldly

It is quite safe, I promise. The door is right over here.

Petrichor and Ersch have a new release for The Warehouse Sale, the Elian dress, and talk about something to turn heads in. You may (or may not!) want to add a pair of panties, but either way it looks fantastic. I used the Fabric hud and selected a deep wine colour which came out fabulously in the lighting. The lantern is also by Petrichor, a part of the huge Flareia collection of lanterns, orbs, candles and flames, all wearable on either your left or right hand and with options for the holding animations. There are also crowns and halos, for adding even more sparkle to your life. You will find Flareia at GothCore.

The long, high ponytail is a Truth Collective release by Truth and Wasabi for the Truth mainstore. A scrunchie holds up the pony tail and the style options include which shoulder it falls over and with or without bangs. For once, I went with bangs, I love how to side curls frame the face in that version.

Lore has a lovely addition to their Oasis series out at the November round of We Love Role-Play, a rustic desert house and three types of large jars/amphorae, and I set it up together with the Oasis walls and well that were released some time ago. The house consists of a single room, with cracked and worn walls, and a ladder takes you up to the rooftop through a hatch. That is where I decided to setup the Djinn’s Rest, a little lounging area with animations that I picked up from Roawenwood during 25 L Tuesday.

The sexy Astra outfit by Salt & Pepper would perhaps best be described as fantasy lingerie, with ornate metallic accents on both the top and the boots. And these make excellent use of PBR, just like the Oasis house does.  With the fatpack you can mix and match all the colours and textures, allowing for a lot of different combinations.

Very sexy is also the extra long Bora hair from Wasabi for Kustom9. The HUD lets you switch between bangs or no bangs as well as a more windswept style. Here I went sleek and serene.

Second Life has finally launched mirrors, PBR terrain and 2K textures. I am excited about all of these improvements, but especially mirrors. As it happened, I was working on setting up for a video to show some of Dutchie’s latest releases when this news dropped and Firestorm quickly got out a beta version that supported these changes.  That made it very easy to slip in a brand new (not yet released) version of Dutchie’s vanity, updated to use true mirrors rather than the reflection probe work-around that became possible with the initial launch of PBR. So, you get a video of me preening in front of the mirror, with some bonus looks at the gorgeous use of PBR materials on these pieces. I also want to remind everyone of Hair Fair which runs until the 16th of June and where you can get the cool style-changing hair from No.Match that I am using in the video.

The Luxe range from DICTATORSHOP brings class and elegance to your home or perhaps to an upscale club. The furnishings offer a chance to relax in style on smooth velvets accentuated by shiny metals. Here I have combined the Ladies Chaise with the Floor Lamp set (which includes a single lamp with a small integrated table and a double lamp) and opted for the Copper metal option and the Cinnamon colour for the fabric. There are, of course, several more metal and fabric options, as always accessed via the DICTATORSHOP logo on each piece of furniture.

The Ladies Chaise comes in three versions in regards to the animations: PG, Adult Vanilla and Adult Kink Femdom. I am using the latter here though sadly on my own, but the classic smoking pose is from the femdom menu.

The sparkly little outfit is the very sexy Jade dress and matching bolero from Salt & Pepper, out for L$75 until the end of today. The hair, too, is a time-limited deal; a new hairstyle from Exile called Estelle, out for Fifty Linden Fridays.

The Heritage series Dining Table from Dictatorshop is the perfect choice for your country estate, combining traditional elegance with a modern twist.  With 10 wood textures, 12 leather textures and 10 fabrics you can create the perfect look for your house. There are also presets for quick and easy customization. By clicking the central runner you can choose centerpiece decor options such as flowers, food or candles and by clicking the placemats each person can choose their own food from several different menues.

The Dining Table is available in two versions, PG and AV. Both have social and dining animations as well as some cuddles and kisses, but the Adult version also adds sex animations. All of the couple animations move the female to where the male is sitting.

To play on the country estate feel, both of us decided to use pieces from Salt & Pepper’s English Rider set.

It would not be the Dog & Pony Show without new releases from Teegle and this year they’ve got a massive lineup of news: two new horses, three new dogs, resized versions of the first three dogs released and also dog collars and leashes. And that is not even all, there’s more to come in a few days!

The new horses are a “Jewel” the Percheron and “Spice” the draft foal. The Percheron is a draft breed from France which descends from the medieval warhorses. It is not generally as tall as Belgians or Clydesdales, but it is quite solidly built while still being agile. In France, only black and grey Percherons can be registered, but the US registry allows additional colours. The default coat for the Teegle Percheron is a beautiful grey, but I have some new coats from the Dog & Pony Show to share with you as well so I applied the lovely dappled Poe coat from Royal’s Customs. As you can see, it includes some very nice materials as well. Royal’s Customs has several more gorgeous coats at the event.

After a busy day, is there a better way of relaxing than in a warm bath? Dutchie‘s latest release lets you relax in a luxurious claw foot bathtub and includes all the additional amenities you might need—wine, for example!  I used the bathtub and the accompanying releases together with some beautiful bamboo arrangements from Kaerri, adding a touch of green lushness to the elegance of the furnishings. The bamboo is from a set called Shiburi which includes several different Japanese-inspired planters and they can be found at the Plaza event which runs for a few more days, until June 13th.

As for the beautiful bathtub and the accompanying releases, it is available at FaMESHed for June. The bathtub comes in a PG and an Adult version, which means you will likely see it again as I explore the Adult options. This post, however, highlights some of the solo PG animations.  There are 20 of those (the Adult has 10 additional mature solo animations), including some with auto-attaching props (using the AvSitter experience) such as a book, a wine glass and a razor.

The tub includes options for the sound (which is very soothing and realistic!) and for the colour of the tub itself and of the metal. The metal options are also available on the mirror (which is available as a wall-mounted and as a leaning version) and on the lamp, whereas the side table has colour options. Both the bath caddy and the side table can be rezzed out either with or without props and the props seen on them are also available as separate pieces for full versatility.

How fortunate that I sent Ran to shop the Salt & Pepper retirement sale, because a few days later it turned out that a naughty priest was just what I needed for the couple pose “the Noose” from Be My Mannequin.  Clearly, the temptation of the beautiful concubine was too much for this man of the cloth. 

I am wearing the very revealing Keraves dress from Petrichor & Ersch, a one-piece outfit with plenty of texture options for the fabric and the gems. Here I went with gold and red to match the utterly stunning Theodora Circlet from Old Treasures. That has to be my new favourite piece of jewellery in SL. And it fits very well with the beautiful new Morgana hair from Magika, a must-have style.

Just a moody shot inspired by the season, dark and autumnal and with the Samhain Rune Tree from Del-ka Aedilis as the focal point. With a carved stone set in front of the tree and runes made from twigs dangling from its bare branches, it definitely fires up the imagination. Has perhaps more gruesome things hung from those branches as well?

The Popsicle hair from Wasabi for The Fifty is a style that says party to me. In this case, it turned out to be a pool party where someone forgot to change into more suitable attire before getting into the hot tub. The glass of wine might have something to do with that…

The dress is one of Salt & Pepper’s aquasense outfits and while it won’t react to non-SL water unless the water is scripted for that interaction, the HUD does allow you to set the clothing to wet or dry as you prefer. In this case, you can see how the soaked dress clings like a wet garment would.

The wood-fired hot tub comes from Dutchie and can be had either as a PG or Adult version. Both seat one or two people and include several animations with auto-attaching props like the wine glass.

The best kind of rain is a soft summer rain and sometimes it can feel wonderful to be on the beach when it happens, perhaps even take a swim in the rain.

Be My Mannequin’s “Feel How it Feels” pose (inspired by Stranger Things and its usage of Kate Bush’s fantastic Running Up That Hill) was perfect for the image of just sitting on the beach and letting a gentle rain wash down over you. The Lemongrass hair from Wasabi is a lovely, summery style which also comes with a hat for an even more beachy look and the Amelia shirt and shorts set from Salt & Pepper is part of their interactive Aquasense range, meaning it can go from dry to wet and vice versa when interacting with SL water and various scripted objects. Selected colours are on sale for the weekend.

Del-ka Aedilis has three new releases for the A Thousand and One Night event; a large divan, an elegant tea table and a matching floor cushion that is available either at the event or as a group gift at the main store. Each piece is offered with a 25% discount at the event which lasts until June 25th. Three fabric colours and three shades of wood are included where applicable and the divan and the floor cushion include animations; singles only for the cushion and singles and couple (including adult animations) for the divan.

To complete the decor of the room, I used pieces from Libertine, Paper Moon and Senzafine. The outfit is from Salt & Pepper with the snake armbands being a gift at the Shop n Hop from AtaMe. Another gift from there is the subtly metallic lipstick from alaskametro.

The latest furniture release from Dutchie is a cozy outdoor sofa set with enough space for 6 avatars if all 3 sections are used (for a smaller sofa, you could use just the middle section or put together the left and the right without the middle). To fit in with the rest of your decor, the sofa offers 4 wood options and 7 fabric colours. There is also a matching table with the same 4 wood options.

If you choose the PG version, the sofa comes with 10 solo animations and 10 cuddles. For the Adult versions, some 80 couple animations are added. Adult versions, you say? Yes, the sofa is available in FF, MF and MM, and you can get a set that allows you to mix and match different sections to cater to all your guests. To read more in detail about the various options, see the product page.

I placed my sofa set on the patio of Trompe Loeil’s Modern Villa, overlooking the pool. That gave me an excuse to slip into a bikini by Salt & Pepper and for Ran to be dressed for some casual lounging about. My hair is a new release from Wasabi, a very flattering style called Ash that you can get at Kustom 9.

I don’t often impulse buy skins, but a charming face and a good cause sold me on Zlata by Leronso, a Ukranian creator, at the Skin Fair. The creator will be using all profits from selected products (such as the Zlata skin) to support help organisations in Ukraine and that is of course something I am more than happy to contribute to in the current situation. Zlata is a pretty, subtly freckled skin that comes with red brows or without brows. Since I rather like red hair, I kept her as a redhead, but these brows are the new ones from alaskametro. I also went over to their main store to pick up a body skin; these come in fatpacks of all the tones and there’s a few different variants to choose from depending on the type of shading you prefer.

Wasabi’s new Coconut hair is cuter than my usual style, but I really love it with this face. Coconut comes in two variants and with optional, unrigged bangs.

The saucy, inviting pose is the latest from Be My Mannequin and it is out for the Limited event, which means only 120 copies will be sold. Also available at the event and limited to 120 copies are two special fatpacks: The Boss Is On A Roll and The Fall Of A Rebel Angel.

Both Ran and I did some shopping when LeLutka had their Black Friday sale ( I picked up Zora and Inez while he got Paxton and Skyler), but with December being so busy we’ve not had a chance to play much with making new shapes until now. But here I’ve got a nice combination of Nar Mattaru’s Delphine on Inez while Ran is wearing Clef de Peau’s Evan on Paxton. I also picked up some new pieces on Salt & Pepper’s current retirement sale, where selected releases are at 80% off and the Miya dress struck me as a great one to wear for this intimate and possessive couple pose from Be My Mannequin?