Thursday, June 1, 2017

4 Ollin about halfway done.


It is such a lovely feeling when you know that it is nearly over and it is going to be everything you wanted and more. I still have a ways to go with this but it is coming together so beautifully.

The yelek and belt buckles are both solid 20s mother of pearl, and i managed to find some MOP fingerbone shaped beads by accident. The ollin-lauburu symbol my husband made for me turned out fine, and those are yak bone beads from a mala there. The fabric is from an unused bolt of mourning silk for a kimono, and it is lined with silk from my first wedding dress.

I'm going to add another ollin-lauburu on the center back seam of the yelek in the manner of a semi-formal single crested kimono.

Sunday, April 9, 2017

4 Ollin--Movement

It's been about four years since I've posted and many things have happened. I'm returning to this blog to chronicle my new fashionaut adventures in real life.  Instead of going to normalcy I seem to have fallen into another set of subcultures as is my wont.  So now the focus is on belly dance costumes, and steampunk, because that seems to be the obsessions of the moment.,,

So we begin with a new costume I'm making for my appearance at the ABDC showcase, which isn't a big deal, but for me it is a long cherished goal that was interrupted by a severe illness that might have ended my ability to partake in this hobby.

So to prevent any mishap I am adding embroidered symbols on my costume.  The theme for this is the Aztec glyph "ollin."  It means movement, and it is part of the name of the current (or if you believe it ended in 2012) the past sun.  
The colors I chose are going to be based on this scheme. But everyone does Art Nouveau so I'm going for a more 20s look.

Sunday, August 11, 2013

Don't mess with a Missionary Man.....

So, it has been over a year since I have posted. I will get to what I have been up to in that time, later. For now, I will introduce you to my human avatar, which has been shown in these virtual pages before. Her name is Calamity Juana. Yes, it is much easier to keep my alter egos with variations of the same name, and I have been answering to Juana now, for ages and ages it seems. Calamity Juana is a member of a Steampunk fusion dance troupe called "Ladies of Arabella Rose" and we've had a few shoots and some events lined up.

Today we had a photoshoot at Mission San Jose, in San Antonio. I wore this outfit. My Steampunk character is supposed to be from South Texas, (specifically the defunct Republic of the Rio Grande) and I have taken  pains to give her outfits that kind of flavor.  Many of the people in that area are technically criollo Tejanos, and not Mexican.  It seems like a slight distinction but one my relatives are very fussy about. Touchy points of pride and all that.

in front of the mission doors by juana manuel

The Mission is still in use and in this image I was wondering if I would have to escape because parishioners were still coming out the doors. I wanted to go inside but our outfits were a little too risque for that. We did go into several rooms that were obviously kitchen and living rooms. The walls are pretty thick for defense and for primitive A/C.

Here's a different shot of the same outfit.  I had a long discussion with my mother and examined two photographs of my great-grandparents during the early Edwardian Period.  There's not a great deal of visual evidence for what Tejanos wore but my mother was able to give me some anecdotal guidance based on the old people she saw and knew.  Generally clothing was very simple and somewhat vaguely kept to the style as best as they could.  My personal preference for a blouse and a dark skirt is apparently very much in line with what a lady of Juana's background would wear.
My preference for flashy colors and flamboyant styles was not at all typical of a Tejana lady apparently.  I was annoyed to find out that the custom of wearing all black to mass was not common in this area.  At any rate, the effect I was after was a neat elegance, with a bit of an equestrian flavor tossed in.  The bolero was a horror to assemble--the pattern is from 1863 and people were TINY then.  The pattern as it was unaltered would barely fit a child. It took some screaming and continual muslin making and even now it still needs a little work in the form of darts for more shaping. The grey lace mantilla on my head belonged to my grandmother, and I figured why not, since I was technically in a churchyard. The two bracelets on my arm were given to my by my grandfather when I was about 14, during a shopping expedition in Laredo. 

The Pious Leather Calamity Juana wears:

Black headband veil and mini top hat, from Claire's.
Leather corset from Orchardcorsets.com
Leather gloves from Amazon
Black linen skirt made from Burda 7894 patter
Beige lace shirt given as a gift from my mother
Bolero adapted from original 1863 pattern done in red silk chenille
Lunge whip borrowed from the barn
Megan wig by Sepia

Wednesday, February 22, 2012

the hermit; or never regret...

what you have neglected because of your happiness.  that is the only excuse i will give you, that i was following the light at the end of my lantern. it is still burning very brightly, and i am still journeying with my companions and my new love, but i am learning to wander through the flowers and the high grass in the fields that flank the road, happily unaccompanied in my own reveries. but no bouquets of regret.





 this little bouquet was collected as i wandered an unknown sim last october, dressed as coatlicue, the serpent skirted mother goddess. today when i was working on something unrelated i saw the clips from this adventure, and decided to use it as my re-entry into the sl blogging "monde" after my long retirement. it is also something of a late valentine, too.



coatlicue juana wears:

devon 3b skin & visions of death eyes by
rotten toe
guja snake queen outfit & modded headdress elements from vita's boudoir
pout tattoo by little pricks
archaic choker by grim bros
los muertos tattoo
x & y model hair 16
thigh high boots by j's

dax riggs cover  performed by andy morellion

thank  you andy for permission to use your cover.

sim unknown.

Sunday, October 10, 2010

xipe totec, or juana has a bad hangover

the first thing i thought of when i saw the new skins from MadScience Labs was the flayed god, xipe totec. of course, i don't expect the rest of the world to be as pre-columbian addled as i am. the next thing i wanted immediately was a human skin ballgown (in second life of course) to go with the xipe totec theme. for those who do not know, the priests used to wear the flayed skins of sacrificial victims till they rotted off. besides, if you were skinless it seems that would be the perfect material to wear.




sadly, there were no human skin gowns that i could locate in sl. however amusingly enough i came upon a company in the real world that makes faux human skin garments. after some searching, i found an acceptable substitute, the cute zombie bloom dress from Rotten Toe.  it is not a new release but i couldn't resist the human heart ornament and blood spatters on the dress.  juana decided to get all julio cortazar as a tourist, and it was intensely hilarious to be at the Visit Mexico sim in this getup, bumping into honeymooning avatars on horses.

juana "jose cuervo you are a friend of mine" wears:

zombie bloom and visions of death eyes by rotten toe
mia hair by ploom
mad science [[skinnned]] skin by Rev Eponym
thigh high boots by j's
paperdoll necklace by i love 13
p bouc piercing by female paradox & alpha
skull mask by punkerella summers
bloody bonehead bracelets by retox

at Visit Mexico sim & the Moreau Institute

Monday, August 30, 2010

and she's buying a stairway to juana

yes. i am into the big dresses. perhaps it is the residue of the elizabethan gowns i used to wear in the SCA. this is a pretty excessive dress. whoa. paging mr. beardsley. it looks like the peacock tendrils threaten to engulf juana and any other unfortunate avatar that might be nearby. however, that's beside the point. i think i am kind of in love with the house of beningborough now, because they seem to specialize in that kind of dress, you know, the showstopper dress that has its own zipcode and upstages all the other people at the party.





i have to say that i really was at a loss where to go in this ultimate statement gown, and was completely surprised at how fabulous the chouchou xvi (the babel) sim was.  i have visited a few of the chouchou sims before, but hadn't seen this one yet.  i still don't know exactly what it means, or what the boxes are supposed to do, and for the life of me at first i imagined some sort of jacob's ladder with angelic fashionistas floating up and down (but the funky alpha effect kept messing up my dress) and then i wanted to pull out a lighter and sing "stairway to heaven" because i realized how hilarious it was.  this whole dream/hallucination of ours has an economy, and juana just happens to be one of the materialistic bottom-feeding shopping heaux that makes sl run.  that is, never a producer, always a consumer....

slairway to juana wears:

dancing peacocks dress by house of benington
delilah stockings and glovesby nightshade designs
aztec goddess 2 tattoo by ink blots
tilly (night) hair by truth
nose piercing by avz
rose hairpin suede wine by gfield
abbadon torc by tekeli'li
antracite skull earrings by DECO
thigh high boots by j's
devon 3a skin and visions of death eyes
by  rotten toe

Saturday, July 31, 2010

Eshishoegasm (kinda not safe for work)

I fervently love Eshi Otawara's clothes, even tho I've never met her in person.  She is one the deities in my revered personal SL fashion trinity (the other divine pair being Cutea Benelli and Alpha Auer). Her new releases lately have just made me squeal with delight.  Which brings me to the subject of this installment--I was going to pretend to have a screaming shoegasm in her store, (and indeed she said via IM it would be alright) but you know I can't do that sort of thing without laughing.  Enter the immensely talented Miss Lillian Shippe, who so graciously provided a genuine sample on request (a rather impertinent request I suppose) and even remixed it!  I must thank her again and express my deep gratitude for such a beautiful gesture and her beautiful voice.




On a related note, why the hell are sex animations in SL so stupid? I mean, poor Juana is a virgin and all, and I've literally never had a reason to use them (just imagine me trying to explain that I needed it to pretend to have a shoegasm in a store) but I swear I was so annoyed with how idiotic it made Juana look that I really wanted to tie that stupid prim genitalia to a prim brick and throw it through an *unnamed* prim plate glass window.

100% Genuine Orgasm performed and mixed by Miss Lillian Shippe, Vocal Orgasm Model.

Juana wears:

Aria Pompadour gown, hat, gloves, and facial tattoo
Mayan Dream tattoo by Garden of Ku (tinted)
Bloody BoneHead Bracelets by ReTox
Thigh High boots by J's
Abbadon torc by Tekeli'li
RUI306 Hair by Boon
Xcite genitalia
Bone queen skin by Cutea Benelli
Visions of Death eyes by Rotten Toe

Special thanks to Miss Lillian Shippe and Eshi Otawara