Left: Clothing: Pinstripe Blazer in Navy, Armidi; Open Shirt in White, tinted, shirt and pants layers, E. Watkins; Lace top on the undershirt layer (from the Ericka outfit), Archange; High-waisted Jeans in Charcoal, tinted, Blaze. Shoes & Accessories: Stole in Black, CE Cubic Effect; Lucky Horseshoe Bag in Black, Bare Rose; Pilot Glasses in Black, FNKY; Woman’s Sandals in Black, Aura; Classic Tank Watch in Black/Gold, Muse. Hair: MMS Jessica (Bangs) in Charcoal; Skin: MMS London Fair Makeup 1b.
Right: Mimi Coat in Gray (Dark), Cachet; Cambridge Vest (from Aufren White/White Outfit), Armidi; Turtleneck Sweater in Lilac, (undershirt layer, prim neck reattached to chest), Cachet; Cropped Pants in Grey, Coco (lengthened leg prims); Shoes & Accessories: Kavika Sheen in Black, Pixel Mode; Focsani Bag in Lare, Armidi; Pilot Shades in Black, FNKY; Earring #110, Kraftika. Hair: MMS Grace in Ash Blond; Skin: MMS London Fair Makeup 1b.
Winter in Grey
This season once again brings us a variety of beautifully made prim coats – only this year the choices for open coats, jackets and blazers are plentiful where they were once scarce. Everyone may have these but it is up to you to put a personal spin on your coat of choice, and these two – the Pinstripe Blazer from Armidi, and the Mimi Coat from Cachet’s winter line – are my picks for this month.
I’d been searching for an open sculpted blazer the previous week (a texture-only open blazer is still a rare thing, let alone a sculpted one) to complete an outfit I had based on a shot of the very chic Ai Tominaga, when Armidi released these. SL still lacks a great many ingredients for those who like to mix and match subtler key pieces, among them unbuttoned cardigans on all layers and shirts with loosely sculpted bottoms, so I just made do with this shirt from E. Watkins, thanks to the help of Voshie Paine. For the lacy undershirt I used the Ericka top from Archange, threw on a scarf from Cubic Effect and the versatile high-waisted jeans from Blaze. I slimmed down the prim flares for a more up-to-date silhouette and added a pair of quirky strappy flats from Aura. I think the unusual design of these shoes adds a great deal of character to a subtle outfit. Note that like the shoes I featured previously the highlighting on these is a trifle bright. A leather bag and watch complete the ensemble.
For the second outfit I’d been meaning to put something better together for this coat, which is my favourite piece from the Cachet winter line. Several others have posted the exact same coat, so I apologise if this is getting a little repetitive. I was too pleased with the result not to include it however – I’d been seeing these sculpted cropped-leg pants from Coco on SLMaMe for the better part of a week, and instead of using the wide-leg pants from CE that everyone else’s been wearing I thought to lengthen them to suit what I had in mind, to end just above the ankle. Note that the pants have a texture gap on clients prior to RC 1.22 because of the way sculpted prims are handled; changing the sculpted prim type to torus rather than cylinder in the building editor will fix this. Cocoro has taken note of this, but for those of you who already bought the pants, the above solution should work. I was iffy on matching this with the ribboned version of the Kavika shoe from Pixel Mode (which is a great value by the way, as, like most of the newer PM shoes, it comes with an extra pair) but as with the first ensemble I thought the more unusual choice would add more interest to the outfit. If you don’t want to bump into clones wearing the same coats I suggest saving these for a rainy day – they are too good to pass up. Dela also has a new open coat that I had no time to include in this post, but is another worth taking note of.
Guild of Crie
The second part of the post has to do with the newer releases from a little-known eyewear shop known as Guild of Crie. I believe they’ve been posted of before but thought their newest offerings were worth noting in this blog, especially as they offer some of the tiniest intricate primwork I’ve seen, on very unique and elegant pieces. I always appreciate such prim craftsmanship and attention to detail, and it’s my pleasure to include these monocles from Grazioso Alekseev in this post.
The first style, the =GC-Monocle (Dark-Knight clock)= is my favourite from this store. Elegant and intricately detailed, it’s worth collecting for the beautiful primwork alone; note the tiny gems in the clock face are separate prims, meticulously arranged. This monocle features a functioning clock that can be set to any timezone. All of Guild of Crie’s timepiece-style eyewear appear to have this feature.
The second style I’m featuring here is the no less gorgeous exclusive version of the Guildio monocle, available only at the new Magic of Oz sim. This is a fantastic piece – note the pair of ruby slippers textured in miniature along the top of the monocle and the emerald inlay, in keeping with the Wizard of Oz theme. Just as remarkable as the first monocle, it’s a fine example of Grazioso’s painstaking attention to detail and commitment to his craft.
The third piece I had the chance to review was the Flugel – a pair of quaint and yet very wearable spectacles that were inspired by the elegance of the piano as a classical instrument. The lenses and frames – separate parts including temples – are all colour-changeable (the colour names are in Japanese). I found this pair worked well with everyday styles as well as more formal or Victorian wear.
That’s all for this week. 
Thanks goes to everyone who put up with the making of this post and to Bridge Aya and Graziano Alekseev of ::le Reve du Crie::. Poses featured are from Grapevine by Grazia Horwitz.
Shopping Information:
Guild of Crie (mainstore) and at Magic of Oz (location of exclusive monocle)
Shop Armidi at http://shoparmidi.com/
Cachet & MMS
Cubic Effect
E. Watkins
Aura
Bare Rose
Archange
Blaze
Coco
Pixel Mode
Kraftika
Muse
Truth
Grapevine
They say you can take the girl out Canada..
