Author: auralynne

I’m excited to post these photos – I do believe they are my prettiest photos to date!  They were taken at Wickham park in Manchester CT.  I’m a bit obsessed with the location – although most of it isn’t antique, it is utterly gorgeous.  It’s hundreds of acres of park which seems to have been landscaped and accented for the express purpose of being as picturesque as possible!

First up, is my “Lady Adventuress” gown, modeled by  Maddy Wooding.

The addition of leather accents and accessories lends a bit of steampunk flair to the look.  I could (and plan to) also make a two tone black/brown version of this gown – accented with brown instead of black leather – which would look even more steampunk!

And the hat – oooh the cuteness of the hat!  It’s a leather fedora that I shortened to make it look more like the late Victorian era hats that perch atop the head.  I can get them in black, red, or brown, and I absolutely plan to make them part of my regular line.

This second gown is modeled by Jordan Goodrich.  It’s a new twist on my Vintage Diva design that I’m calling “Oriental Splendor.”  The fabric has dragons and phoenix’s woven into the pattern, and is oh so elegant.

It’s hard to see it in this photo, but she’s leaning against a really cool looking statue of a Chinese temple dog!  There are two Asian themed gardens in Wickham park, with all sorts of gorgeous accents placed all around.

Her hat is one of my wool “topper” styles, which I figured out how to shape so that it comes to my signature pointed front.  Mmmmmm peacock feathers!…

And here is my favorite picture of the day!  The sad thing is that I can no longer order the hat base needed to make this hat (I could do other colors but not ivory.)

The model in these photos is Alexa DaFonte, and she is wearing a gown I’m calling “Lace and Allure.”

It’ll be available for a limited time in my store – while supplies last on the blouse since it’s a piece I ordered from a clothing wholesaler.

Lauren Anne Page did an utterly beautiful job on the makeup on these ladies.  Perfectly blended, and it stayed looking fresh and fantastic despite it being a hot sunny day.  She had some kind of magic solution in a spray bottle to “set” the makeup.  It was a breeze editing these photos!

This was a group photo shoot with Trisha May Photography, and she posted very many more gorgeous photos from the day on her blog here.

It’s probably a bit too late for Christmas-y pics?  Oh well, I forgot to post them in December when they were taken, so here goes!

My sister in law Megan is wearing a new-ish design – a high low purple cloak.  It was intended to be floor length on myself or my sister, so it’s awesomely long and trailing on her:

These were taken outside the Westerly library, before the Christmas decorations came down.  It always makes me sad when the decorations have to go away, and it’s just plain old boring winter from there out.  If Christmas were in February, that would be perfect, because then when the decorations come down, at least winter is almost over!

/end rant/

XD

This is my favorite cloak picture.  I love how bright the purple satin on the inside is!

The folks at the library were AWESOME.  Megan told us we should check out the inside – that it was a gorgeous Victorian era building.  We poked our heads in, and the library staff were like OMG you look so awesome/why are you dressed up/ you match the building perfectly!

Their excitement made me brave enough to ask if they minded if we snapped a few pictures.  We did match the building perfectly.  🙂

The sad part is EVERY picture blurred out horribly.  Apparently I have a lot to learn about indoor photography.  But these I was at least able to edit to death to make them presentable.

The library had some awesome holiday themed  book sculptures there, and we snapped a couple pics of Megan with them, just for kicks.

Those did turn out quite clear.  I think the lights saved them.

Many thanks to the friendly folks at the Westerly library for letting us borrow their gorgeous building for a few!

Photo credits:

I thought I’d take a second to share a few pics of my holiday gown.  It’s a long sleeved version of “Victorian Vixen” with a matching capelet for a bit of extra warmth.

I’m still wearing lace but notice the lack of see-thru-ness?  It’s the best quick and dirty trick to make my line of very lacey clothing carry over into winter times.  Sweater leggings, a black maxi skirt from my street clothes, and then the lace skirt over the top.

And the capelet – OH the capelet!  Have you ever felt minky faux fur before?  It’s the stuff that faux fur baby blankets are made from – uber soft and thick.  The issue with using it in clothing, is it usually only comes in boring pastels.  I was elated to find it in black, and a bunch of beautiful jewel tones, from one of my fabric wholesalers.

And yes, the ENTIRE inside of the capelet is made from this softy-soft fur.  Which means technically, it’s reversible.  Me personally, I cannot allow my shoulders to part with the softness.  But in a pinch, it would give you a fur capelet on the reverse side.  I do have plans to make capelets with fur on both sides to solve this issue.

“Dark Winter” Gothic Victorian Gown by auralynne, and modeled by the same

Pics by her long suffering husband (baby do you mind doing a quick photo shoot this afternoon – Quick, I promise, quick!)

As promised, here’s the second half of the pictures from the cold and windy day.  The following photo is my absolute favorite of the day:

The best part – the look on my face was an accident – I intended to have my eyes open and staring off into the distance, but I blinked!

I had originally intended to wear a different gown that day, but fate (and my very disorganized brain) was against me.  I’m working on new winter looks and had a brand new velvet underskirt and shrug that match a velvet corset – that I had misplaced.  After spending about half an hour searching, I gave up and looked for something different to wear.

(Incidentally, much later, I found it – WITH THE KITCHEN TOWELS. Absent minded much?)

I didn’t have anything else BRAND new that I wouldn’t be freezing my patooties off wearing.  I did have this cloak:

So I thought ok – what do I have that will match this cloak and at least has sleeves of some sort??

The shrug in these pics looks like a new design, but it isn’t!  If you wear a “La Rose Gothique” shrug underneath a “Belladonna” shrug that’s what it looks like!

The skirt is also two skirts layered, as in most of my designs.  I like having a WARDROBE rather than a few costumes – and having foundation pieces that can be worn with anything makes that possible.

You may recognize this look – it’s practically identical to my “Imperial Belladonna” steampunk costume.  I’ve had several requests to sell that costume with an underskirt instead of leggings, and people always ask “will the belladonna skirt look alright with the lace underskirt?”

So I figured if I couldn’t find the parts for what I intended to wear that day, at least I’d get pictures of something practical.

The hat is a safety pin special – meaning I took a couple things I had and pinned them together for the look.

It’s a “Dark Delight Lolita Tilt Hat” with a pair of cheap-0 steampunk goggles (the ones you see attempting to overtake ebay searches at the moment) pinned to it!  Although I should note, if I wear this for real, I will either make a pair of smaller goggles, or get a pair of real vintage welding goggles, which also tend to be smaller.  I had to toss any picture where I was staring head on at the camera, because holy crap huge goggles on a delicate hat.

And my jewelry – don’t you love the jewelry? – is from Vixen’s Delight, as always.  The set is called “Fallen” and this is a perfect example of how well her jewelry lasts.  This is from Andrea’s personal collection, and it seems to be the piece most often grabbed since it’s a blend of all things gothy and steampunk that we love.  Usually one of us is wearing something that would like a touch of “gothic angel” so it’s been worn many many times.  It’s still silver and has lasted thru many shows, which is what happens when you use all steel rings and pins, and cast metal pretty parts.

And last but not least, how about a completely goofy pic?

If you recall from my last post, Andrea was wearing an all white bridal outfit.  She had brought this bouquet for a prop, and since it looked totally goofy with my look, we snapped a pic just for fun.

~Credits~

Gown designer and model: auralynne
Jewelry artist, Photography: Andrea Daunis of Vixen’s Delight
Hat: Mad Rose Hattery

Yesterday was photo day – and we had one takeaway point for the day:  The shoreline is very cold in November.

The weather man was a big fat liar – because it was supposed to be in the 60’s!  Instead it was 55 and very windy (our fault, for choosing a mansion by the coast for our shoot.)  But luckily one of my brand new items to debut in this photo shoot was this cloak.

I love the look of a long flowing medieval cloak, it’s just so elegant and beautiful.

But I also love Victorian style capelets, I mean… BOW!

What’s not to love about that level of cuteness?  I came up with this design to try and combine the two.  I make a ton of high-low skirts, so I thought, I bet I could develop a high low cloak pattern!  I’m super pleased with the result.

It was very difficult to choose a favorite from this shoot – because so many of them were so good!  But here’s one of my favorites:

These next pictures show off the gown she was wearing.  It’s a design very similar to Victorian Vixen – but in white, and I crafted a bustle skirt in satin to match.

The below photo I kept zoomed out because of the pretty setting, and I love how her pose makes it look like she’s dancing.  Photos were taken at UCONN’s Avery Point campus.  There’s a gorgeous mansion out there – and no one seems to mind two weirdly dressed girls coming to the grounds to snap photos of eachother!

~Credits~

Photography, gown design: auralynne
Jewelry artist, model: Andrea Daunis of Vixen’s Delight
Hat: Mad Rose Hattery