Linden Lifestyles is featured in the Style section of today’s Financial Times, the stalwart London financial daily printed on salmon pink broadsheet paper. Which, while distinctive, does such atrocious things to the colours of printed photographs that many weeks I’m surprised they have a style section at all.
In any case, the journalist who covered us asked me for a hand in styling her avatar for the sidebar piece, and since this sounded like it was going to involve quite a lot of shopping, I was happy to help make the real Fiona virtual:
To get started, Fiona sent me some photos of herself and some photos of her favourite catwalk looks, and we went to work on the arduous task of stripping SL’s leading retailers of their avatar essentials and finest fashion offerings.
Obviously, every avatar needs a body, and for this, I send people to Haver Cole at Lemon. This lithe and not-too-busty shape is a slightly modified Paper Doll avatar, which is no doubt being oogled by British tycoons over tea and toast right this very moment. For skin, it was Gala Phoenix and Jack-O-Lantern in Medium. We did try other skin retailers, but if what you want is burnt orange, trust me when I tell you - the choices are thin on the grid.
For hair, Fiona was quite attched to her real life locks, and frankly if my hair was that colour blonde I’d be attached to it too. Nobody does bombshell blonde quite like Six Kennedy, and Fiona ended up with the Sass style, similar to her real life hair, from Gurl 6.
Surprisingly, ruched bodice solid colour dresses like the Bottega Venetta dress Fiona lusted after from the catwalk were very hard to find - I suspect because they’re a little plain in only two dimensions, and that’s not something SL designers embrace all that often. In desperation I even posted a bounty offer, and finally Neferia Abel’s Ivalde store delivered up the charming Charlotte dress.
Shoes for this dress were 42 kinds of nightmare - 42 being the number of pairs of shoes that were tried and discarded along the way. I ended up pulling out an old, old, old pair of Hot Gear shoes called Corkz (I’m not sure how much they were or if they’re even sold any more) and teaming them with just the top ornaments from Sylfie Minogue’s very extreme Tribal shoes from Prim Seduction. It sorta worked, although the overwhelming prevelence of stipper heels continues to be a really painful problem in SL - and, if you’re trying to explain why this is to a fashion journalist newly initiated into Second Life, a rather embarassing one, too.
We spent two entire days shopping to deliver a number of outfit choices to the photo editor at the FT for selection. I shot and submitted outfits from Pixel Dolls, Last Call, and Callie Cline in addition to the outfit from Ivalde which was ultimately picked for print. I loved all of these outfits (and have been desperatly whinging about not being able to blog them) so I’m very glad choosing between them was not my job!
You can see all the outfits we put together for this story on fashion and real world brands in the outtakes. You can also read the main article online, or check out the scan of the side bar and photos. And if anyone ever asks for your help in styling them for the style section, by all means say yes - but be prepared to shop till you drop.
Haha, love the quote at the end of the sidebar story
Comment by Sansarya — May 19, 2007 @ 2:16 pm
“Surely Second Life can’t be as catty and cutthroat as the real world of fashion?”
“Oh Honey, you have no idea.”
Mwah ha ha ha ha.
You did a great job in styling Fiona. You can be my stylist anytime.
Comment by CronoCloud Creeggan — May 19, 2007 @ 4:41 pm
I’m impressed, The Financial Times, no less! Fabulous work - the outfit rocks! How nice to see a journalist talking to real secondlifers instead of forming an opinion based on one hour in-world explorations.
Comment by Milla Michinaga — May 19, 2007 @ 7:14 pm
Fantastic job! Excited to see FT cover Second Life style. (And yes, full color on pink newsprint, eeee… scary.)
Comment by Celebrity — May 19, 2007 @ 9:04 pm
[…] The stylish ladies behind LindenLifestyles.com — especially Sabrina Doolittle — play a big role in this article about Second Life style in Financial Times, one of the leading business newspapers in the world. You can read more about the effort Sabrina put into doing a makeover for the reporter in her post here. […]
Pingback by Second Style mentioned in Financial Times at Second Style Fashionista — May 19, 2007 @ 9:13 pm
wow sabrina!!! that is a fanstasic job you did!!!
way to go!!! you did a really amazing job on this… the article was cool too…
yay!!! (waves to CCC)
i know how hard you worked on this and i can see it paid off, i will most certainly send anyone i know your way to get an AV set up!!! (be ready)
xoxo,
caLLie
Comment by caLLie cLine — May 19, 2007 @ 10:00 pm
Has anyone had luck finding the Sass hairstyle (Gurl 6)? If so, I’d be in your debt for the coordinates
Having a hard time finding in the store. Thx
Comment by Tifosa Twang — May 20, 2007 @ 2:46 am
Peristence pays off again
It’s at 171, 12, 41 (Gurlywood), for those of you also looking for the style 
Comment by Tifosa Twang — May 20, 2007 @ 3:11 am
[…] Financial Times just wrote an article on SL’s fashion industry (hat tip to Linden Lifestyles). The main article is here [link] and Sabrina Dent scanned in the sidebar here […]
Pingback by Out to Pasture » Blog Archive » FT on SL Fashion — May 22, 2007 @ 5:39 pm
[…] achieving that retail marketing goal – virtual worlds like Second Life are the logical next step. Here is an interesting piece about the making of the sidebar image (pictured above) for the article in the Financial […]
Pingback by Second Life Retail Branding? « Virtual Fashion Technology — September 18, 2007 @ 11:37 pm