BlakOpal Designs

victorian • steampunk • pirate • fantasy

Nantes: a stylish suit with a steampunk flair

27 June, 2010 09:24 AM | steampunk, suit, brown, fashion, black, SL, men, red, burgundy | Permalink
The latest suit in the shoppe for men is one of my new favorites. It's called the Nantes Suit and comes in four versions. This is a very versatile mix-and-match suit, with jackets interchangeable with vest-shirts, and multiple layered sculpted collars.
The BlakOpal Nantes Suit in black with a red vest has a wonderful houndstooth tweed jacket with a series of small buttons down the front, and a contrasting suede collar. The vest, in a shade of deep red with a subtle cog pattern, has a standing collar and metal buttons. The shirt underneath has a starched standing collar and french cuffs with cog cuff links. A classic silk bow tie is wrapped around the neck. The outfit includes coordinated pants with smooth pants flares. There is also a marvelous mekanikal belt buckle worn over the coattails with rotating gears and antique map.
Other colors include the BlakOpal Nantes Suit in chocolate brown tweed with a black vest. With it's own stylish standing vest collar, these outfits still looks fabulous without the jacket, for those time when you want to be a bit more relaxed. Separate collars also means you can wear a different vest with any jacket. The belt is also separate from the coattails, giving you even more opportunity to personalize your look.
The BlakOpal Nantes Suit in brown tweed with a copper vest.
And BlakOpal Nantes Suit in blue tweed with a burgundy vest.
I think any (or all) of them would make an excellent addition to any wardrobe! I do hope you enjoy them.

Many hugs!
=^.^= blakopal

BlakOpal Designs in Second Life (SLURL)
blakopal galicia
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... White Tie & Tails ...

24 May, 2010 10:17 AM | Permalink
"I just got an invitation through the mails: 
"your presence requested this evening, it's formal 
A top hat, a white tie and tails" 
Nothing now could take the wind out of my sails 
Because I'm invited to step out this evening 
With top hat, white tie and tails ...

I'm steppin' out, my dear 
To breathe an atmosphere that simply reeks with class 
And I trust that you'll excuse my dust when I step on the gas 

For I'll be there 
Puttin' down my top hat 
Mussin' up my white tie 
Dancin' in my tails"
(~Fred Astaire singing Irving Berlin lyrics)

You'll need to sort out your own top hat, but we've got you covered for the White Tie with our new Lexington Tuxedo. It's the ultimate in men's formal wear, sleek and sexy with that touch of class. 
The BlakOpal Lexington Tuxedo - White Tie has a black cutaway jacket with satin-trimmed lapels, worn over white wide-lapel button-front vest. The starched white shirt has black stud buttons, and is worn with a white sculpted bow tie. The jacket has flexi tails, split at the back. Matching pants are detailed with satin stripes that run down the sides of the legs, and the pants are beautifully finished with pants flares that give you a crisp silhouette. And what tuxedo would be complete without a white rose. 
The BlakOpal Lexington Tuxedo - Black Tie is worn with a black vest and black bow tie. Another great style that looks fabulous on the red carpet as well as that special ceremony you may be planning. Our BlakOpal Two-Buckle Shoes are the perfect accessory for either suit (sold separately).

Hope all your days are suitably fabulous!
=^.^= blakopal

Shot on location at the Rose Theater (Angel Manor (130, 81, 35)
blakopal galicia
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Precious Gems Gowns

25 April, 2010 08:46 PM | steampunk, tea-length, formal, fashion, victorian | Permalink
Ever since I made the Precious Metals Gowns, I have been wearing the copper gown around the shoppe. It's become one of my favorite outfits. But I kept wanting to wear a purple version. "But there aren't any purple metals", I'd tell myself. Then it hit me ... I should do some Precious Gems!
These gowns have the luminescencent glow of the metals gowns, with the faceted shimmer of beautifully cut gemstones. Available in a wonderful Amethyst purple, and a gorgeous Sapphire blue, which just happens to match the Men's Habsburg blue-vested suit.
Both the BlakOpal Precious Gems Gown in Amethyst, and the BlakOpal Precious Gems Gown in Sapphire come with three skirt options. It can be worn as a stylish tea-length dress, with the more formal long skirt, or with the addition of the victorian-style bustle. The sheer shoulder drape wraps loosely around the bodice, giving you a beautiful decolletage, and the elbow-length gloves add just the right touch.

This is an elegant, versatile gown ... one I hope you enjoy wearing as much as I do.

=^.^= blakopal

Photo info ...

Men's outfits:
BlakOpal Habsburg Suit in Black & Blue
Blakopal Levant Suit in Purple
Women's accessories:
Womens shoes by Basevi Moda (SLURL)
Pearl necklace by JCNY (SLURL)
Diamond necklace by Wunderlich's Historical Garb (SLURL)

Shot on location in Paris 1900 (SLURL)

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New for men, the Habsburg Suit!

17 April, 2010 01:13 PM | steampunk, suit, menswear, fashion, men, victorian | Permalink
After many requests for our male customers (and lots of prodding from Trilo *g*) I am very happy to announce the release of a new outfit for men, the BlakOpal Habsburg Suit. With a wonderful stand-up collar and silk trimmed lapels, this is a very stylish outfit. The shirt comes with a high collar with a wrapped cravat, and brocade silk vest … which we are also offering in a bundle of five additional colors. The pants are in a fabulous two-tone contrasting fabric. The suits are available in four versions.
BlakOpal Habsburg in Burgundy with a Champagne vest, and warm-gray pants. 
BlakOpal Habsburg in Black with a Wine vest and charcoal-black pants.

And because we know you're thinking "But blakopal, I don't have Ivory shoes to go with that suit!", we also present the BlakOpal Nexus Low-Top Boot in Ivory. (You're welcome. *g*)

These suits & boots are available now at BlakOpal Designs (SLURL), and also available on Xstreet.

I hope that you enjoy the new outfit, and have a great day!

=^.^= blakopal

Suit photos shot on location at the Isle of Cheswick (SLURL)

blakopal galicia
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BlakOpal's Bridal Shoppe

04 April, 2010 11:49 AM | steampunk, boots, platinum, white, wedding, gown, cream, pertnering, fashion, corset, victorian | Permalink
There have been a few changes going on on Reachra Island, home of BlakOpal Designs (SLURL). This week we have begun creating a few specialty stores that might be of interest. I'll be writing about the new places as I get a chance, and of course you are always welcome to stroll and explore as you like. They are all located down along the streets that lead from the Main Store and along the docks.
Today's focus is on the store next door, BlakOpal's new Bridal Shoppe. You may have visited this storefront when it housed the Photo Studio. If so you'll be happy to know that shop isn't gone, it's just moved upstairs.

The new Bridal Shoppe is a gathering of a beautiful selection of white, cream, and platinum gowns from the various BlakOpal Designs collections, for easy side-by-side viewing. We hope that you will find it useful when you are looking for that perfect dress for your partnering ceremony, or any other celebration where you want a special white frock.

And when you are ready to find dresses and suits to pair with your selection, our main store is just a few steps away.

Wishing you all a wonderful day!
=^.^= blakopal
blakopal galicia
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Precious Metals Gowns

25 March, 2010 03:48 PM | steampunk, tea-length, metal, gown, mettallic, formal, fashion, victorian | Permalink
Shimmering with layers and layers of super sheer metallic fabrics, wrapped around the waist, and encircling the shoulders … like a virtual cloud of wonderful, ethereal silk. That's the idea behind the new Precious Metals line of gowns. Shimmering in gold, platinum, and copper, the metallic fabrics are simply luscious.
These gowns are designed to be stylish and fashionable, spanning any time frame. Worn with the long skirt and bustle, it's perfect at your next Victorian ball. Remove the bustle for a more modern, but still formal look, or wear the tea-length skirt for everyday wear, or that special afternoon event where you want to look less formal, but still stunning. 
The BlakOpal Precious Metals Gown is available in three metallic shades. The low-cut strapless bodice is encircled around the waist with a silk wrap that ties at one side in a long bow. The sheer pointelle tulle shoulder wrap circles loosely around the shoulders and upper arms, with draped ends at both shoulders. Matching elbow-length gloves, thigh-high stockings, and panty complete this stylish ensemble.
Available at our main store (SLURL), and on Xstreet. More photos can be found on our web site).

Gold and Platinum shot on location at the Rose Theater in Angel Manor (SLURL).

Accessories: Gold necklace and earrings: '85c Midnight Masquerade' by Jewelry by Jake (SLURL), Pearl necklace and earrings: 'Divinica' by JCNY (SLURL), Copper shoes: 'Ekota Amber' by Enkythings (SLURL). Copper bracelets and earings by Steamy Victoria (SLURL).

=^.^= blakopal
blakopal galicia
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A Celebration of Red

12 February, 2010 07:31 PM | Permalink
This weekend, with Valentine's Day around the corner, seems to me to be a great time to celebrate. Not because of the traditional giving of hearts, cards, and candy (love should be celebrated every day, not only on one day out of the year) but because we get to wear RED! I love that valentines day is a festival of red. As anyone who knows me at all can attest to, i am a HUGE fan of red. *grins* ... So today's blog is dedicated to some of my favorite items, in my favorite color!
One of my favorite pieces of jewelry, which just HAPPENS to also be a perfect match for the holiday, is the Pulsating Heart Necklace from the Golden Thorn, shown here in Red-Black (but comes in a wonderful selection of colors!) and looking fabulous with the BlakOpal Anastasia Gown in black & red. Thorn Witrial is the designer, and I'm a big fan of his work. I highly reccommend you swing by there for this great piece. (SLURLS are listed at the end).
While you're at Thorn's place i'll also point you to my second favorite piece of jewelry ... his Daedalus rings. I love the Raven Ruby version, but it also come in other gem stones, and different metals. The winged styling of the ring goes beautifully with the fine lacework of the BlakOpal Dark Horizons Lingerie, among others.
Another necklace worth looking for at the Golden Thorn, is the Mystic Darkling Ruby Ivy Necklace. It's subtle, animated texture, and celtic symbols make this a real eye-catcher. Especially fabulous when worn with a low cut gown, like the BlakOpal Baroness Gown, with it's see-through lace bodice and embroidered velvet waist cincher.
My recent excursion into landscaping, while setting up the Botanical Preservation Atrium in New Babbage, brought me to Uni Ninetails shop the Forest Floor in Winterfell. The place is filled with some fabulous plants and flowers, and i was able to bring back a lovely Berry Bush to plant outside the gazebo in Reachra. The red of the berries was just what was needed outside the shoppe. Here I'm showing off the lovely BlakOpal Amaranthine Dress, with oodles of lace and sexy peek-a-boo cutout front.
And while I was out trying on my favorite outfits in red, I couldn't help but throw on the BlakOpal Valhalla Dress. This is the predecessor to the Amaranthine, with lots of openwork lace on the bodice, and a varied-length skirt that's just dripping with venetian lace, this still rates highly on my list of the outfits I just love to wear.
Anchored off shore on Reachra, is my favorite Pirate Vessel. It's the Cormorant from the BlackSpot Shipyards, which (YAY!) come with the option of red sails. I recently ran this ship in a race of Tall Ships during the New Babbage Fleet week celebration, and even though I didn't win, I had a great time sailing. Of course I had to show off my favorite sexy pirate outfit while I was at it *g*, the BlakOpal Vanguard Lady Pirate outfit with Skirt. Red sails in the sunset, indeed. 
My final selection for the celebration of red is my new skin, with it's fabulously lush red lips. Designed by CTL Skins, I featured this skin on a few of my signs, and immediately started getting comments and IMs from people, wondering where I got it. The first skin I purchased was a very goth-pale tone with darker lips, also beautiful. But this shade has become my new favorite. It sets off the BlakOpal Andante Gown beautifully, I must say.

Here are thelocations of the shops mentioned above:
The Golden Thorn (SLURL)
Forest Floor Gardens & Dreamscapes (SLURL)
BlackSpot Shipyard (SLURL)
CTL Skins (SLURL)

I wish all of my wonderful friends here, on twitter, avatars united, and in second life a wonderful weekend. 
Lots of love and hugs!
blakopal galicia
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The BlakOpal Anastasia Gown in four colors

05 February, 2010 10:43 AM | gothic, wedding, gown, formal, fashion, lace, victorian | Permalink
It's been a while since I have posted any news here. After the busy holiday season, and other busy times in RL, I decided I needed to take some time away from the virtual sewing machine. It was nice to be able to get some things done in the tangible world, but now it's time to get back to what I love … and that's making beautiful fashions! It can't be denied. *g*

So I am very excited to be able to present a beautiful, full, flowing gown I have named the BlakOpal Anastasia Gown.
It has an amazingly full skirt, with lots of layered tulle, accented with embroidered details, silk roses, and finished with rows of gathered lace. The bodice has a long-waisted tabbed corset that flows out from the waist with more rows of lace that hang over the top of the skirt. The corset top can be worn with or without the shirt underneath. Sheer with embroidery at the shoulders the sheer silk top is gathered into very feminine ribbon bows at the shoulders. The outfit is finished off with sheer lace embroidered gloves, thigh-high floral-patterned stockings, and panty.

This gown is designed to be as beautiful in motion as it is at rest, with full crinoline petticoats that peek out as you sweep across the dance floor. It comes in four color combinations … 
The Anastasia Gown in Black & White is beautiful in it's contrasting light and darks. With a black and white corset set off with black undershirt and gloves, and an overlay of black tulle over white satin skirts.

The Anastasia Gown in Black & Red takes the overlaying of tones and adds lots of sexy color. The red silk skirts are overlaid with black tulle with accents of white silk roses, and silver and black gathered laces and satins at the hem. Simply beautiful in it's rich detailing. 


The Anastasia Gown in Black & Purple takes things in a darker, more gothic direction with all black detailing on the tulle, lace and silk roses over a deep purple silk skirt, with a corset in shades of purple brocade with black lace and details. 

And at the opposite end of the color wheel is a gorgeous Anastasia Gown in White with tones of white and cream layered in lace, tulle, and embroidered details, and accented with white lace gloves and sheer top, and stockings.

I hope you get the opportunity to see these gowns in world. If you happen to see me wandering about the shop, feel free to ask me to model it for you. I'm always looking for a reason to put this gown on. *g*

Have a great day!
=^.^= blakopal

blakopal galicia
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BlakOpal runways show at Menswear Fashion week

11 January, 2010 02:52 PM | Permalink
I want to give a big shout out to all of the models who made todays BlakOpal Menswear Fashion Week runway show a success. The show lasted 1.5 hours, and we had 8 of the hottest male models showing off our clothes. We were well represented by (in order of appearance) Dragonbird Amiot, Mangioso Lohner, Cape Harbour, Liam Netizen, Lexi Vargas, Apollo Call, Locked Semaphore, and RicoRacer Flux … all models from the Siren agency, and our announcer was the lovely Lexie Jansma, the owner of Siren.

This was our fourth runway show and I was a bit apprehensive after a previous show didn't go off as well as I had hoped (let's just say i was cringing several times during that show, hoping that it was just me seeing the mis-matched outfits. *oof*). Having a bit more experience under my belt, i tried to be a bit more proactive about making sure things were going to go right, without being too much of a 'stage mother' (lol). We had a short list of male models we enjoyed working with and asked for them by name (Lexi and Locked, thank you!) and went so far as to put photos of each outfit in the packages we sent over to make sure the guys had an idea of what the outfit was supposed to look like. Not sure if this helped them at all, but it went a long way to quelling my fears!

The guys all looks fabulous, with each outfit looking really great as each model took to the stage and made their way around the runway. I spent the show busily cam-ing and snapping photos, trying to get just the right angle to capture everything just right.

... and that leads me to my one gripe of the show: the staging didn't seem to be very well thought out. The stage building was interesting, they did a nice job getting it to look a bit steampunk, though the textures on the wall were a bit too busy for my taste. Often the outfits were lost against the dark colors.

But when the models moved away from the stage things got even worse. The models headed in opposite directions along the circular track around the audience meeting up again on a raised bridge at the back of the audience, which was fun, but there were no backdrops! so the models were either viewed against a very dull blank horizon, or against the mall filled with shops. They could have easily put up some interesting backdrops to shoot against, which would have made it feel like more of a special event. (In comparison, The London Fashion Week runway shows we did handled this much better.) In addition to that, the bridge at the back had a very large railing at the front of the platform, which made it impossible to get any decent shots there.

i really wish the people running this show had thought a bit more about creating an environment that would show off the outfits and models a bit better. It could have had a much more theatrical feeling without too much more effort. (gripe over)

I don't mean to dwell on the negative here, but I think it's worth mentioning in the hopes that this will be better thought out in future shows we do. I do appreciate that a lot goes into putting these shows on, and I am grateful to everyone for putting their time in to make it a great experience.

I hope we had a few new converts in the audience, though with the high number of ladies present, I think they may have been there to more gaze on the models (and who could blame them!). Thanks again guys, and Lexie for a great show. I now can happily look forward to our next runway show without fear! *smiles*

=^.^= blakopal

Here's a selection of some of my favorite shots from the show … and this link will take you to the flickr set of show photos taken by Tillie Ariantho for Siren.

Dragonbird in the Airship Pilot outfit

RicoRacer in the Nexus Pirate

Dragonbird in the Desert Expedition Suit

Cape in the Levant Suit

Apollo in the Bentley Fur-Trimmed Coat outfit

Locked in the Nighthawk Suit

Cape in the Peacock Feather Suit



Lexi in the Cogsworth Suit with Animated Steampunk Gears Wings



Liam in the Ivory Feathers Suit


blakopal galicia
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Announcing: The Nexus Clockwork Pirate

27 December, 2009 11:04 AM | Permalink

At long last (and i mean long!), I am very excited to announce the newest addition to the shoppe: the Nexus Clockwork Pirate! An outfit that has been assembling itself in my head for a few months now, the Nexus combines two of my very favorite things, steampunk and pirate clothing. Designed as a classic pirate outfit, it includes lots of highly detailed and animated parts that gives this a decidedly steamy twist. It seemed to me a natural fit, since we are in the age of piracy of both the air and sea, certainly pirates would adopt mekanisms to help them in navigation, and survival. Like the mekanical arm with navigational instruments and rotating gears, and the gem-powered metal belt tied at the waist with rope.

This outfit is stylish and very detailed, with armored shoulders draped with sheer fabrics, and sturdy tricorn hat topped with several ostrich plumes (which are tintable to match your heraldry, if desired.) On the back is the power unit, with several rotating cogs and glowing gems, with tubes and wires leading in to the body.

The buckled front jacket is built with sturdy pieced leathers to withstand the harshest elements. Remove the solid leather shirt from beneath, and the outfit is tantalizingly sexy, with a gladiator-esque look.

The Nexus Clockwork Pirate comes in two color variations, black or brown.

And men, you will be happy to know the outfit includes a pair of low-top boots (or are they high-top shoes? i can't decide.) Which have stacked leather heels and soles, and several straps of leather with a metal buckle at the ankle. The boots are also available separately, in either black or brown.

All outfits are available now in the shoppes in SL (SLURL), and on xstreet. Photos shot on location at the amazing Steelhead Shanghai.

Happy pirating!
=^.^= blakopal
blakopal galicia
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