StyleCard: Kalnins Empress

The recently released Empress shoes from Kalnins are impressive. On the heels (pun intended) of the Coquette shoes, Maris Kanto has released the Empress, improving them in so many ways it is hard to believe that these are really only his second women's shoe released. Gone is the need to wear a size 11 foot as the basis for the shoes, but also the prim feet have arrived allowing for more versatility and sex appeal. The HUD that Maris created might just be the easiest one I have encountered to date, and there is a very simple system that allows you to individually re-color parts of the shoes; buckles, straps, sole, body, accent, and nail polish can all be selected from a palate to match anything you can imagine!

The Stuff;

Shoes - Kalnins Footwear - Empress

Skin - Gala Phoenix, JUNE Sundust (Frex)

Hair - Posh, Lolli Sexy Buns -Umber

Top - :bijou: *GG* Doll corsetcami [Yellow] - former freebie

Skirt - Sweetest Goodbye Day Dream - Black (pants & skirt from Dress Set)

Accessories - Fresh Baked Goods

Oh My, Those Toes!

I am so glad that Siddean Munro thought to send me her latest release, not only has her talent continued to grow since the last time I reviewed her footwear, but it seems that her shoes themselves have sprouted toes, well whole feet really. I am a fan of prim feet, and it seems that the blogging community is warming up to them, really it was only a matter of time. Change can be scary, and amputation humour aside, I think that prim feet are here to stay and will continue to improve. Siddean's feet are cute, well not her actual feet, the ones in her two shoe styles that I am reviewing here, the Lovely Legs and the Desire. The SLink foot has a different look to the other famous feet in shoes which I am more familiar with, I find them to be attractive but a bit softer and more ample around the heel and toe areas, giving them a more animated look.

What I simply adore about these is the HUD attachments that make skin matching and customizing your shoe and accessories just a few clicks away. It did take me a few minutes to read the quick start note card that arrived with the shoes, but the process after that was easy as pie and I was happy with the result. Bright funky colors and even toenail art make these a really fun shoe to style to match your look perfectly. I will say that because they are a single attachment shoe, without an separate ankle section, I had to be a bit more careful with the poses that I chose to show them off, ankle position for more extreme poses yielded some interesting results, but for general walking and most typical AO poses this would not be a negative factor.


The Lovely Legs style, shown here in green are super sexy and did in fact make for that lovely legged look, especially with the new Lime version of the Elate! Felicity Dress. More newness is the completely irresistible hair from DejaVu called Lady Crocodile. I added some great touches of color with the customizable head band, lemon yellow beads from Ume Mode (color change), Bangle set from Finc! and Patent Lemon purse from Celestial Studios. The Desire shoes got the pink treatment with the same Elate! dress in Blush, and another morsel from DejaVu, the Mademoiselle with customizable trio of bands. Simple and Sparkling accessories from U & R Dogs, a personal fave, completed the look.

Please visit Siddean for her sexy shoes, and her other wonderful items at SLink.

What a Knock Out!

The arrival of the Stiletto Moody BARE© has really stirred up a lot of discussion in the fashion community. Talk about who was first, who is or isn't revolutionary, and as usual about value for our Lindens spent. One thing I want to clarify before I launch into my review of this particular item, is the quotation provided by the Stiletto Moody team that suggests it was the first sculpted shoe in Second Life. The official press release contains the following "...the designer who brought sculpted shoes to Second Life introduces Stiletto Moody BARE ©...", at the time I included that in my Rumor Mill post I was relaying the leaked information as I had received it. And although I feel comfortable saying that Stiletto Moody is responsible for bringing the first hyper-realistic and highly detailed sculpted footwear to SL, I do believe it was not the first footwear to use sculpted components.

And now for the details of the new release, and all things considered, I do feel it warrants the buzz it has generated. We are talking about something that is a complete foot in shoe system, now i know there is something out there that has a foot and shoe, but Stiletto Moody has as always sought to go a bit further, the elegant ankle wrapped shoe, the wisp thin sole, the highest of heels, and a perfectly manicured and beautifully shaped foot and ankle are really sensational.


Something of this magnitude can only be fully realized with the special features that allow for custom skin matching, ankle fit resizing, complete toenail polish set and toe ring options, and then the usual bells and whistles associated with the SM brand. The ones shown here are the BARE Greta one of three new styles, and I found it fairly easy to match my skin tone (note these were done in a bit of a hurry, I could easily have fiddled more), and was positively blown away by the elegant look of the foot and wrapped ankle straps, the subtle shadows across the toes where the strap sits. I noticed very few glitches with the joining of the avatar body with the ankle/foot, particularly after I resized the ankle slightly. There is a nice range of shades here; Bad Seed Red, Black, Midnight, Silver, Gold and Taupe. An amazing bonus here is that these work extremely well with almost all of my standard and artistic modelling poses, the potential for photography is great here.

As with other SM releases, this one coincides with a 40% rebate at time of purchase sale for all previously released footwear. For more details on the 'Members Only' sale please join the Stiletto Moody group for access and information. (click images to enlarge.)

Stiletto Moody Main Location here.