One of the best things about being a blogger is that every so often you catch the eye of a designer and receive an unexpected IM asking you to take a look at his latest creation. Such an event happened to me a few weeks ago. (Yeah, I’m not the timeliest of bloggers.) The back story is that I visited a beautiful sim called Empyreal Dreams awhile back to shoot some photos of Ghanima Uriza’s (+++Blue Blood+++) Frilly Death in Whitegoth White. (You can see them here if you’re curious. 
) Well, the photos caught the eye of one of the creators of the sim, Remington Aries, and he was the issuer of the aforementioned IM. Empyreal Dreams has ventured out into clothing, and he graced me with this amazing gown.
First, a little more backstory. Empyreal Dreams, is a Destination Guide art sim which visualizes four famous poems using Second Life as a canvas. One of the poems is Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Raven.” This dress, the first of three, is a continuation on the theme of the poem and the sim, and is quite simply, wearable art. The dress lifts text from Poe’s well known poem and interweaves its meaning, words, and accompanying graphics from the art build, into a full-length evening gown.
One of the themes of the poem is the passage of time (in the sense that the speaker hopes for time to diminish his grief over the passing of his dear Lenore; or for time to one day reunite him in death with her). Accordingly, Mr. Aries and his partner Ariel Wingtips, have woven delicate, ghostly Victorian time pieces into the fabric of the front of the gown, and embedded a fully functional steam punk skeleton clock (shown above) into the right side of the gown. Multiple ‘ghost’ layers in the skirts reveal not only the time pieces, but also white silk, clouds, pendulums, autumn flora, and constellations. Through a careful use of transparency and lighting on textures, the dress reveals different details depending on the time of day. You can imagine how difficult this dress is to photograph, but wearing it is an experience not to be missed!
The gown also has a soft, scripted particle emitter that rezzes falling leaves around you. (A non-emitter skirt is included as well.) Miniature irises, a recurrent theme from the sim, adorn the headpiece, shoes, and glove embellishments. Why irises? Traditionally, irises are associated with death as Iris was a Greek goddess of the rainbow, which she used to travel down to earth with messages from the gods and to transport women’s souls to the underworld. But my favorite part of the gown is the train. The entire second stanza of the Raven is woven into the gown as a lace train.
Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December,
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.
Eagerly I wished the morrow; – vainly I had sought to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow – sorrow for the lost Lenore -
For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels named Lenore -
Nameless here for evermore.
As mentioned above, the gown comes with all the extras you need – the fascinator, gloves, and two pairs of shoes – silver and black, and cream and gold. The sculpted dress bodice comes in several sizes, and the designers have included notecards and pictures to help you achieve the best fit.
The jewelry worn here is from Fairy Tale – which is closing (*so sad*) very soon. All jewelry is deeply discounted, so run! I’m also wearing LAQ’s subscribo gift Christmas skin and the LadyBoy hairstyle from Vanity Hair. Long hair would have obscured the gown, so I chose this shiny, close-cropped style. By the way, no post-processing was done on these pics, just simple cropping, and adding pretty frames via Picnik. I also took some on-location shots at Arctica Dreams and Christmas Island. (Why didn’t I take the location shots at Empyreal Dreams? Well, I figured that would be a bit too “on the nose.” However, I highly recommend a visit to the sim; here’s a limo for you!) To see the pics, simply follow the link to my flickr page on the left. Until next time….
Happy hunting, gathering, shopping, etc. *mwah*!
Details:
Gown with Fascinator and Shoes – Empyreal Dreams Couture - The Raven – The Lenore Winter Gown
Hair – Vanity Hair – LadyBoy – Pearl
Skin – LAQ – Ebba (Ivory) – DB – Christmas Gift 2011
Jewelry – Fairy Tale - Shooting Stars Necklace and Piercing
Lashes by Amacci
Eyes by Fashism
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