Men's Second Style

I rarely feel the need to look traditionally professional in SL.  You may have noticed that I keep an inworld office, although not, um, actual office hours.  It’s rather casually appointed–there’s no desk, although there is a little-used conference table– and I pretty much use it just for meetings and the occasional interview.  There are times, though, when a man needs to look like he means business, literally, and in those circumstances it’s entirely possible that no amount of themed gear will do.  While a jacket may be optional in today’s “business casual” environments (I can hear Secundus cringing from here), a quality dress shirt is essential.  Pompo Bombacci’s new “Faze” dress shirts come in four office-appropriate colors:  Cream, Light Blue, Green and Purple.  The fabric texture strikes a nice balance between freshly ironed and comfortably well worn.  If not done carefully, the former can feel too “crispy” for my taste, while the later can look like you slept in the shirt, in your car…in the office parking lot. Read the rest of this entry »

Men’s liberation time! The extremely talented aoimizuno Meili of LPP (le petit prince) created these wonderful Art Deco / Valve-Tech attachments with women in mind. In fact, they’re just a small part of a collection called ‘Digital Doll.’ But most of the items in the series aren’t really gender-specific and they are gorgeous.

There are several pieces to talk about in the first photo (as usual, be sure to click on it to enlarge). Let’s start with the Art Deco Headset (180L$). I don’t want to know how many prims are in there; I probably can’t count that high. The detail is amazing, but it’s the overall feel of smooth clean parallel precision that will win you over. The headphones attach to your ear, so your nose is free for your glasses. The glasses I’m wearing look like part of the set, but in fact they’re my trusty old primOptic Arctics, with the colour scripting utilized to match the LPP stuff (set frame colour 1 to ‘sienna’ and frame colour 2 to ‘dark grey’ if you’re following along at home). Read the rest of this entry »

“Sweeney Todd meets Artful Dodger meets Vogue. You can wear this Whenever.” So says the notecard included with Raven Pennyfeather’s new extravagant ensemble for men, called “Timeless.” Raven has a veritable gift for creating elaborate themed clothing designs that blur the lines of era, style and gender, so I’m inclined to take her at her word on this.

Part Carpathian warlord, part vintage dandy, part bondage master, “Timeless” is not simply appropriate but de rigeur for any number of pastimes, from arguably innocent to highly questionable. As you put it on, and then begin to take layers back off, your racing mind will no doubt envision multitudinous scenarios in which to explore all it has to offer. It is the perfect expression for your more decadent, lustier side. Come, fall into that pool of hedonism with me. Read the rest of this entry »

Hmm.. I’m short. I’m skinny. I’ve got red hair. And I’m wearing a long coat. I’m Ryan!

In fact, it was Ryan who pointed me this plain black frock-coat from Gaslights Emporium. The outfit, sans hat, is available near the entrance to the store, along with both a free male and female skin. The ensemble, like most sets from the Gaslights Emporium, is very flexible, with the top part separated into a shirt, vest, and coat on the undershirt, shirt, and jacket layers. The ribbon tie is a prim accessory and the bottom of the coat is a prim skirt. The textures are somewhat dark (it is a black coat after all), but they’re not flat black. My only complaint is that the bottom of the jacket feels rather short. I had picked up one of the skins and originally planned to wear it, but decided against it after wearing the coat and seeing how short it was. Since the piece consists of multiple prims, its a bit harder to scale to size so I decided to go for a smaller shaped avatar. Read the rest of this entry »

One of the things I enjoy most about SL, and this opportunity to share some of the stuff I find there, is hearing about (or from) new or unfamiliar designers and trying on their creations for the first time.  Whether they’re just getting started, or taking their design work in a new direction, there’s something actually kind of exciting about it.  Namida Akami has just two items out at her new shop MUWU, but they’re her first two designs for men, and they’re fascinatingly different from each other in approach, style and execution.  “The English Boy” (L$90) is a classic ensemble: navy blazer over sweater vest over white oxford shirt.  It’s eminently sober and respectable, just the thing for a full day of classes or an afternoon of quiet study at the library. Read the rest of this entry »

Phew.. Easter is over. Should be good till the next giant holiday.. is it Mother’s Day? Anyway, back to business as normal.. or business I forgot about because I was too busy egg hunting.

Adam n Eve recently opened a new boutique at Genesis for a line of high class fancy clothes. In order to celebrate the opening, sachi Vixen decided to put up two freebies — a polka dot dress for the ladies and polka dot shirt for the guys. Now when I saw the shirt the first thing that came to mind was disco. Unfortunately, I’m a bit too young to remember disco, so I decided to inspire myself with the closest thing I do know to ridiculous dancing and outfits — A Night at the Roxbury. More specifically, my speakers were thumping Haddaway for a half hour as I put this outfit together. Read the rest of this entry »

After a tip from Immortal Wingtips, I took a trip over to Filigreemotion.. In short there are now less than 4 hours left in the hunt and it has both hair AND shoes for guys. And its only 15 eggs — should really only take an hour at longest.

In the picture we’ve got:

• Lip Piercing Steve — egg #2
• Co-Sneakers male (Plaid Red) — egg #4
• Torture Me! Set for men — egg #6
• Chris hair (brown) — egg #13
• Bluegray eyes — egg #15

Other items include the Spaghetti Collar for me in egg #9 (shown in both of the next two hair pictures), Low Shoes “Sirius” (Choco) in egg #10, Aaron Hair (Black&White pack) in egg #11, and Billie (Favorites color pack) in egg #14.

I was pleased the other day to find some new newness for the guys at JetDoll.  In fact, I was actually delighted to see what Kity Pidgeon had come up with this time.  Kitty’s new men’s shirts bring together three venerable traditions: bowling shirts, safari-inspired animal prints, and pin-up girls.  Is this a perfect storm of design elements?  Three great tastes that taste great together?  Are they so cool they’re hot?  So hot they’re cool?  You’ll have to judge for yourself, but I think it may just be a little bit of all of the above.  Two different styles are available, called Zebra and Leopard for the animal prints used on collar and cuffs.  The shirt fabric is deep black in color, but the shading includes subtle highlights that suggest actual contour, definition and sheen without simply making the black lighter and thus…not black.  The matching black buttons have a little bit of glossy shine–realistically noticeable but not at all distracting. Read the rest of this entry »

To sum this post up in a few words, the Retrology Hunt was very awesome. Mad props go to Jhuzen Ketsugo for setting it up AND for putting out so many male gifts. For those of you who haven’t visited, the hunt ends today so hurry yourselves over there. The eggs are small and not the easiest to find, but they’re totally worth the effort. And yes, I know I’m lame because I took so long telling y’all about it, and I am sorry about that.

To the right is one of the gifts from Thimbles Emporium, the E Street Hoodie in Bobby Blue Green. Thimbles offered (I believe) a single male egg, or at least I only found one. My hint is to look up . The egg also had a Jim Jones cardigan sweater in cranberry Kool-aid and a “das Plaidinator” flannel shirt. Besides having quirky and fun names these items are quite well done, featuring impressive texture work for their modest price (75L normally). Read the rest of this entry »

There are a ton of Easter Hunts going on. Next time, please just make one huge one that’s like 500 eggs and a week long — this was a serious of case too much to do and too little time. Anyway, I did manage to check out the so-called Grid Wide Egg Hunt and as far as I can tell after 28 eggs there were only two male-specific offerings. Sure, there were some poses and some furniture but most of it was for the ladies.

While I’d normally not complain, I’d have to say that’s not cool at all. Throw us a bone here.. even some crappy “I’m doing this hunt so my girlfriend won’t kill me” tshirt will do (though if I get 50 of these next hunt I’ll be sad too). I understand these are free and they’re gifts so we shouldn’t complain, but only 2 out of about 25 places acknowledge that men exist? Read the rest of this entry »