Monday, December 1, 2008

The Zodiac Avatars of June Dion

Posted by Alpha Auer

One of the things that I have been failing to grasp for the longest time is why the whole metaverse isn't singing the praises of June Dion from morning to night. True, the "Bare Rose Tokyo" has more green dots than just about any other location on the Second Life® map, so this lady most certainly does not seem to be in need of any further endorsements from the likes of me. However, I am still surprised that so many people of exquisite NPIRL taste do not seem to have heard of her utterly mind numbing volume of output, imagination and creativity. I cannot do much better than Xiamara Ugajin, my own freebie/cheapie shopping expert alt, in describing the Bare Rose, June Dion's amazing clothing emporium:

"... The Bare Rose Mall covers a wide range of clothing and accessories that runs the gamut from Cyberpunk and Goth to Japanese Ethnic. And what makes the whole place even more perfect is that no matter how well made (and everything there is extraordinarily well made and detailed to perfection), the prices are still very reasonable. However, reasonable or not, the main avatar has still managed to spend several fortunes in there simply through the sheer volume of what she bought... although June Dion's style is diverse, pretty much everything in the mall itself is wild. Cybermythologies transformed into spectacular, elaborate outfits..."

The Bare Rose carries literally hundreds, indeed maybe close to a thousand (and possibly even more) separate outfits, both for men and women, and it would be impossible to make an even superficial coverage of this bounty with only just one post. Thus, I am planning on making a number of posts about June Dion's clothes and avatars, which I intend to undertake based upon themes such as "mythical", "historic", "cyber", "fantasy" and the like.

So, without further ado, here is the first of these themes: Ladies and Gentlemen, I present to you a selection of the Zodiac Avatars of June Dion...


The Lord of Capricorn and the Lady of Gemini...
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The Lady of Libra...
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The Lord of Scorpio and the Lady of Leo...
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The Lady of Cancer...
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The Lady of Aquarius...
...

All of these, as indeed most of Dion's eccentrically beautiful apparel is made out of multiple attachments, usually modeled as sculpties, which will need to become attached to just about every part of your virtual anatomy. Thus, whatever the Linden Dollar cost of these garments might be, they will doubtlessly be prohibitive in terms of avatar render cost. But in her defense I have to say that I have been wearing oh so many June Dion outfits ever since I first discovered the Bare Rose, and I have yet to crash in any one of them.

It is quite obvious to me the this lady spends extraordinary amounts of time not only in front of her image processing software, rendering to perfection the complex designs of her clothes (every seam, every pattern, every stitch on these garments aligns down to the very last pixel!); but also in research: The patterns and styles used in her garments make it quite obvious to me that June Dion knows her art history and her stylistic references backwards and forwards.

And yes! Prices: What is probably the most befuddling about all of this is that virtually nothing that you purchase at the Bare Rose, no matter how complex, no matter how many attachments involved, ever goes over 180 L$'s and most of it stays around the 120 - 130 L$ mark! Amazing or what?

You can teleport to the Bare Rose Tokyo directly from here. You can view more and larger images of the Bare Rose Zodiac Avatars here.

5 comments:

Unknown said...

Bare Rose is my biggest shopping addiction in Second Life. I'm not actually much of a clotheshorse in either gender, but I keep making my way back to Bare Rose and finding just one more outfit to try . . . I suspect the insanely cheap prices (you get so much STUFF for less than L$200!) have something to do with that, as well.

Aliasi Stonebender said...

In my snarkier moments, it's because the NPIRL crowd probably regards anything as popular as BareRose as lacking in indie cred.

More likely, it's because the fashionista crowd doesn't entirely intersect with the sort of person who is into the kind of art NPIRL specializes in.

Either way, yes. Barerose has a lot of good stuff - if I have a complaint, it's having so many primmy things that are no copy, mod and trans. Transfer permission is useless to me, making several personal copies for my various avatars is not. Still I buy!

Alpha Auer said...

Yes, the no copy thing is a bit of a drag I admit. But then again, my alts have this little habit of passing the outfits back and forth between one another, so I suppose that it is quite handy in that way. (Except for Xia of course, she will not share anything - the dreary old cow...;-).

As for the indie cred: I hear ya! And I suspect as much myself. And, if only they knew what they were missing, is all I can say.

But you see, here is the thing: Who exactly are all those green dots on the map at the Bare Rose? You say the fashionista crowd but what exactly do they do with all those utterly bizarre outfits? Because let's face it, 99% of what is displayed over there is utterly and totally NPIRL to the max!!! Not the sort of cute little, innocuous apparel you wear for a nice evening out. A lot of it is really scary, some of it indeed downright macabre?

It is indeed a mystery...

Anonymous said...

Beautiful photos! and yes Bare Rose has some truly stunning & amazing outfits.

As for the Fashionista crowd, I think for a long time many people have not acknowledged the impact Bare Rose has on each and every person from their first time of setting forth in the store.

As for the total number, its over 1500 - there is a great website Bare Rose now has (http://barerose.xeraweb.com/) where you can view each individual outfit they sell and you can also tick off a checklist of all the items you have.

My total is at 51 but there are a few B@R Items in my inventory that don't seem to have made it onto the website so yes, in total, I have over 50 seperate B@R outfits of one description or another, from Fashion to Art and most definitely everything in between.

June and her team are not given anywhere near enough recognition for a) the incredible outfits that are produced and b) the volume and rate at which it is being produced.

If you are interested to get involved, Winter Jefferson (of http://incoldbloodsl.blogspot.com/) has throwndown a Blogger challenge, not limited to the Fashionista crowd, but to every SL blogger out there, show off your Bare Rose favourite!

<3Newdoll

Alpha Auer said...

Thank you for all this information Newdoll.

1500? Wow! And yet, why am I not surprised? I need to check out that website ASAP...