Second Style Magazine

The influence of big name designers in what we wear is immense, even if we aren’t aware of it, as memorably demonstrated by Meryl Streep’s character, Miranda Priestly, in “The Devil Wears Prada”. So it’s not surprising that the trends seen on the catwalk have made their way into Second Life® fashion. Spring 2008’s trends have a very fresh feel to them, with vibrant colours, bold designs, hippy-chic, tribal prints and sculpted architectural accents. I’ve picked three outfits to show you which incorporate these trends whilst retaining the designer’s creativity and originality.

The Big…

The bold floral print and scuplted shape of my first dress is a step away from what I’ve come to expect from it’s creator, Grace Winnfield who is known for her fabulous ballgowns. The cutting edge design of the Surrealia dress is no less fabulous and perfect for the spring season. The part-sculpted skirt comes in two lengths, the slightly longer version shown here.

Storm Schmooz’s gorgeous Duote 2 shoes had me drooling the moment I set eyes on them. The patent leather and unusually shaped heel and toe are features seen on many catwalks whilst the bright lime green is the shade of the moment. I’ve kept other accessories miminal, the drama of the dress being the central focus of this outfit.

The Bold…

It has to be said, this season’s fashions aren’t for the shy and retiring. Luckily I am neither, so when I saw the latest release from DP Serendipity I knew me and my lindens were soon to be parted.

Bold geometric flowers in bright pinks and greens teamed with above the elbow gloves, this dress is a fashionista’s dream. The subtle hints of yellow are picked up in the unmistakable Periquita shoes and some dramatic statement jewellery finishes a look that is sure to get you noticed for all the right reasons.

The Beautiful…

My favourite of the many colours on the Spring ‘08 catwalks is the aqua-blue favoured by the likes of Christian Dior, Ellie Saab and Valentino. It is also favoured by one of Second Life®’s top designers, Digit Darkes. The Serina dress is absolutely stunning. From the sheer bolero with ruffles and poofy shoulders, past the asymmetric sequinned bodice, to the layered fabrics of the skirt which almost bounces as you move, this dress will make you feel and look like a million dollars.

With it I have worn the unusual backless “SaSa” wedged pumps by Emeriselle Theas of Orchid Dreams in blue spring, and Lassitude & Ennui’s Desdemona necklace and earrings, pretty feminine touches to finish off this beautiful romantic look.

:: What I’m Wearing ::

The Big ::

Skin:: Esthetica Makeup Arts – (EMA+RFL) Neoplasm – Jen (preview)
Shape:: my own
Hair:: Armidi – Armidi Hair – The Milano – Platinum
Eyelashes:: Celestial Studios – (CS) Lashes – Club 13
Eyes:: Skin Deep (now The Body Politik) – Skin Deep Real Hazel eyes/Twinkle Eyes
Manicure:: Skin Within – [SW] Orchid Manicure
Dress:: Gracies – Gracie Girls… Surrealia
Shoes:: Storm Schmooz – Storm Schmooz Duote 2
Bracelets:: Earthtones – Maya Bracelet, Divine Selenite/Silver [R]; Grazia Bracelet – RoseS [L]

The Bold ::

Skin:: Celestial Studios – (DN) Vogue Skin – Amber (Celestial – Astral)
Shape:: my own
Hair:: The Abyss – <TheAbyss> Hair – Oxygen – Light Blonde
Eyelashes:: Celestial Studios – (CS) Lashes – Club 13
Eyes:: Skin Deep (now The Body Politik) – Skin Deep Real Hazel eyes/Twinkle Eyes
Dress:: DP Serendipity – *DPS Audrey : Black
Shoes:: Periquita – Periquita shoes – “White Wendy”
Necklace & Earrings:: ~flirt~ – unreleased

The Beautiful ::

Skin:: The Abyss – Jadzia Noxious_SR[1]D
Shape:: my own
Hair:: ETD – ETD Mary – Elika’s Brown
Eyelashes:: Celestial Studios – (CS) Lashes – Club 13
Eyes:: Skin Deep (now The Body Politik) – Skin Deep Real Hazel eyes/Twinkle Eyes
Manicure:: Tete a Pied (now Fleur) – TaP French Beige nails
Dress:: Digit Darkes – Digit Darkes-Serina Dress-Seafoam (boxed)
Shoes:: Orchid Dreams – Orchid Dreams – “SaSa” Wedge Shoe – Blue Spring
Necklace & Earrings:: Lassitude & Ennui – “L&E” Desdemona – Black & light blue opal

Seen In World :: Yes
Review Copies :: Digit Darkes – Serina Dress; (EMA) Neoplasm skin.
Friends List :: No

Welcome to another weekly round up dedicated to fashionable feet, featuring what you should be wearing On Your Toes!

First up this past week, Anessa brought us the ultra high heels from Adam and Eve, the Seductress Stilettos! These are some serious shoes! Available in 14 shades, these are made to impress, and maybe even intimidate. My fab find of the week was the new shoe goodness from AW Designs, the Schoo (shown left). There are 9 choices to pick from, and a few animal prints. I love animal print!

Never one to slack, Anessa was all on top of the shoe scene. She featured shoes from Truth Hawk’s store and created by Ignite Nightfire, the Newtown Wedges and the Balmoral Pumps. She also brought us an update of the UBU cute cute cute rain-boots, now in 3 adorable new designs.

Anessa was sleuthing and discovered a reduction in prices over at FNKY! She has a nose for fab finds and SALES!  Speaking of fab finds, check out the Sulaco pump from Enkythings. To quote Anessa,  ”…the quality of these is exceptional. They are exceedingly well done, loads of detail from stitching to strap, a perfectly shaped heel and lovely thin sculpted leather parts.”

Finally, is the newness from Lyra Muse at Jaywalk, the Talithia (shown left), a cute combo of leather and wood that gives you height, but still is casual for everyday spring and summer wear.

Well that’s all for now, until next week….Happy Shopping!

We have a huge issue this month, 118 pages of fashiony goodness! April 2006 marked the first issue of our magazine, and I’m very proud to show off our second anniversary issue. We have some great content this month including a mega guide to all of the awesome staffers who put Second Style together month after month, a fabulous interview with shoe goddess Stiletto Moody, and our very own HeatherDawn Cohen. I am also really pleased with our first ever “Second Stylies” awards where our staff compiled their very favorite Second Life designers in several fun an fabulous categories.

Copies are available in world from our headquarters in Le Zoo, from our website as a PDF, and at issuu.com.

I hope you enjoy this issue!

Why hello there, how are you? I know it’s been a long time, but you never were far from my mind!

So yes, I took a long break…but the great news is that I’m back! After frying my mother board, taking a vacation, and just generally being a flake…I’m happy to say I’m back on the round up wagon!  Anyone who would like to spank me for my badness…well, I’ll be available in-world most evening! :p

So, to start off I have to give a big THANKS to Anessa Stine for single handedly holding up the fort over On Your Toes in my hiatus. She is awesome and she has such a passion for the pixel toes, and she did some amazing work while I was gone that if you aren’t a regular reader, you really should check out. 

Sooo without further ado…here is the SL Shoe Week in Review:Just over a week ago we were lucky enough to snag Jonny Tobias for a guest post. Jonny was great and featured some of the great new shoes and clothing over at Redgrave. 

Anessa brought us some uber cute newness from *HUB*. The Venus sandals are worth taking a TP over to. They are sexy and cute and just in time for the warmer weather months.

Next up are the Tie Me Up Dollys and Wrap Me Up Dollys from Erpla Prieto.  These are fun, flirty pumps available in many pretty colors.

Kuranosuke Kamachi of DeLa released some sexy sandals called the Namid Sandals. These strappy heeled shoes come adorned with a gem in the center of the foot. Very cute, very classy for a dressed up summer  look.

My first post back was featuring the newest from Fallingwater Cellardoor of Shiny Things. The Brandys are corked soled slip ons that will add a bit of height to your avatar. These also can be dressed up or dressed down, depending on your mood.

Anessa and I both featured some of the fabulous footwear from Detour. Her picking the Layback FlipFlops and I the SuperSprint Sneakers. Detour has a wide range of products, from hair, clothing, skin, and shoes.

Naima (previously Emporio Naima) crept into my consciousness back in the autumn-winter when they released a most gorgeous must-have sculptie sweater, but over the weeks that followed return visits yielded little new to spark my enthusiasm. However, that changed a week or two ago when a FashCon notice appeared with some new releases. It was clear that someone had been working hard behind the scenes with sculpties and the newly revamped shop held a host of gems I wanted to snap up immediately. Having tried on a demo or two, Naiman Broome, the man behind the brand was kind enough to let me have a couple of review copies to show you.

My pictures aren’t up to my normal standards today – apologies. I can’t even blame Windlight, as I’ve been using it since it was a beta version and love it. I’ve just been having a bad-photo-day (like a bad-hair-day but the evidence is there for longer). Still, I hope they are good enough to give you an idea you can then check out further in-world.

The New York Jacket is a short bomber-style leather jacket which comes with a huge number of options. It can be worn open or closed, with the collar up or down, with a hood, again up or down, and comes with body prims sized for small or large breasts (size 40 on the sliders being the cut-off). There are nine colours to choose from (or ten if you buy the “panchromatic” pack), shown here in blue-black.

The detailing on this jacket is superb. To my untrained eye the textures appear to be a mixture of photosourced with some hand-drawn elements. Whilst I often shy away from photosourced clothing, this is very well done and works well. I’ve teamed it with Musim’s dark-grey leather pants and ReTox’s humourous “Run DMCA” t-shirt for a rock-chick look.

Trench coats were the talk of autumn-winter this year, but are perfect too for showery April days too. Naima’s version, the Roma, is a short leather trench with lovely prim work and fantastic texturing. Again, there are different options included to wear it open or closed, with or without the shirt underlayer. It is also available in a host of colours, but it’s worth being aware that the “Black” version looks very dark brown. For a true black go for the “Black Pearl” colour. I preferred the dark brown leather for my outfit today.

One feature that I was a little surprised about is shown here (see thumbnail). However, if bling ain’t your thing (and it sure ain’t mine!) Naiman is more than happy to provide a script that will remove it, free of charge.

I decided to wear it closed, with the white shirt and collar, a pair of classic black skinny jeans and high heels. I must just mention the shoes I’ve used in this look, by Cybele Pontoppidan. The first pair of shoes I ever bought in Second Life™, having camped and camped to save up precious Lindens, were a pair of Cybele’s boots and despite not being widely mentioned in the blogs she creates some of the best prim shoes there are (pre-sculpties). Even now I think non-sculptie footwear has it’s place and if you’re not already familiar, Cybele’s work is definitely worth a look. Finished with simple under-stated yet perfect pearl studs, this is a look fit for any would-be (SL)celebutante.

A Little Fun…

The looks I have created here were loosely based on two famous ladies, both with a very similar first name. For a bit of fun, the first person to correctly guess who they are supposed to be will win….. well, something A gift-certificate for my store perhaps – I’ll see what I can come up with. Write your answer in the comments section below and please include your full SL name if you would like the prize.

[Please note, this is merely a bit of fun and this competition is in no way endorsed by Second Style itself, so please, no drama :p]

::What I’m Wearing::

Picture 1 ::

Skin:: Dutch Touch – Serie 2 Skin** Sunkissed Makeup 6 :: DT ::
Shape:: my own
Hair:: Calla – Calla Persicaria Dirty Blondes (Honey)
Eyelashes:: Cake – Cake – Flutter lashes – Tintable
Eyes:: Skin Deep (now The Body Politik) – Skin Deep Real Hazel eyes/Twinkle Eyes
Manicure:: Skin Within – [SW] Buff Manicure
Jacket:: Naima – NaimaNYjacketBlueBlack
T-Shirt:: ReTox – !ReTox! Tee RUN DMCA
Pants:: Muism – *Muism* [Leather pants]_Dark Gray Slim
Boots:: Maitreya – Maitreya Bloom Black (foot part only)
Belt:: Sn@tch – :::Sn@tch You Bitch Belt:::
Bracelets:: Naughty Designs – [ND] Sanskrit Cuff and Silver Ring Bracelet by Lost

Picture 2 ::

Skin:: Another Shop – (Le) brow1, gluttony
Shape:: my own
Hair:: ETD – ETD Luth – Smoke Burnt
Eyelashes:: Cake – Cake – Flutter lashes – Tintable
Eyes:: Skin Deep (now The Body Politik) – Skin Deep Real Hazel eyes/Twinkle Eyes
Manicure:: Skin Within – [SW] Buff Manicure
Jacket:: Naima – Naima – ROMA Coat Black (yes, the black looks brown – buy BlackPearl if you want true Black)
Shirt:: Part of the Naima Roma Coat
Pants:: Armidi – Armidi Limited – (F/Skinny) A001 Jeans [Black Classic]
Shoes:: Cybele Pontopiddan at French Gallery – Dame Blanche Pumps by Cybele Pontoppidan
Earrings:: Random Calliope – Pearl Studs-White-Unltd from Mama Harper Set

Seen in World :: Yes
Review Copies :: Yes
Friends List :: No

Over the past two years, we’ve been running an ad server serving buttons and banner ads to several websites. The database hit 40 gigabytes and at that point, our site was suspended until I could fix this issue.

I apologize for the outage. I feel like I have a little idea of how Linden Lab must feel.

Every day.

Well, hello there. Seems that winter is over… and after a period of utter slacking, blogwise that is, if find myself seeing things around again that I think of.. mmmm… now that would be nice to share. I do not plan on going back to high frequency blogging, but I don’t feel totally drained anymore either.

Like this hair. Random TP-ing around in the Japanese sims is always good for a cute find or two.. or four.. or a shop full like this hair that I found at Tukinowaguma. A shop full of cute styles, not always the best of primwork, but over all more than decent, with a modest, but apparently growing selection of textures. Clockwise, starting upper left there is Wakana, a playful, curly assymetrical ponytail. Next to that, my favourite from the 4, Remon. it comes in 6 different colurs… 3 blondes, one of them burnt, black, brown and a redded black. A somewhat odd selection, but the style is just so cute. In the lower right, there is Hiroko, which has the same feminine curls and locks that fall over the shoulders, but sans the flexi part that Remon has. This one comes in 4 colours. And last but not least, my favourite from the men’s shop: Wind. Yes, this hair designer has some really nice men’s styles out as well, which ofcourse do look very good on us as well. Besides these being really cute hair, with prices betweeen 75-100 L$, they are a steal!

Tukinowaguma can be found in Jonetsu Island 

The top I wear is from Petite Fleur, and the skin is PXL Creations Linda in sunkissed.

Seen in world: yes  ~ Review Copies: no  ~ Friends list: no