Skins 2014

[BellaDonna Starflare]

Hello, I've been away from SL for about a year and would like to know which are the top skins stores lately. I am not getting a clear read on fashion blogs.

I'm used to LAQ & Curio. How bout for hair?:matte-motes-evil-invert:

Thanks for your help.

[Sephina Frostbite]

For hair Truth hair and Exile are pretty hot now. Magical has some awesome hairs as well. Mesh and Flexi. Ploom has some nice out of the box hairs that are unique yet sexy. 

[Amethyst Jetaime]

Both LAQ and Curio are still popular skins and I am sure there will be people along posting more stores.  Skins haven't changed much since you were here so in order to keep selling them designers just change the look of them to try to make them 'fashionable'.  Right now that would be skins and shapes that make women look super young like 14 year olds but with an adult shape. The fish face invisible pony riders are fading now. 

The bigger consideration is if you will be using mesh body parts.  If so you'll want to use a skin that includes appiers or sells them separately to use on these bodyparts or choose bodyparts that are set up to work with your skin.  You can now get feet, hands, ears, mouths with teeth showing, breasts, butts, even mesh entire heads (if you don't mind looking like all the other people that buy them).

Personally I wouldn't worry about what the latest fashion is in skins shapes and body parts unless you are a fashionista and have to follow all the fads.  If you do, one thing for sure is that all this will pass sooner rather than later and a year from now or sooner you'll be buying all new stuff.  My advice is to choose avatar components that YOU like and feel the most comfortable in, because in the long run you'll be happier.  Be unique, be yourself, you will be more memorable if you are.

[BellaDonna Starflare]

Thank you. Yes, I've pretty much always done my own thing but wanted to know if any  new skins could possible catch my eye.

The IPRs, oh man.. First saw one about a week ago in an advertisement in a notecard; I must have stared in awe for ten minutes. To each their own, but wow. I thought surely it was a joke.

And by 'fish face' you must mean what I call 'dog face'. Beady eyed & pouty.

Took me a day or two to figure out what 'lolas tango' and 'phat azz' were.. also, appliers. I wonder if it's worth getting mesh parts. 

I guess you're right, not much has change when it comes to hair or skins. I think I'll just save my 'My skins 2 years old, must update' itch for a quality freebie.

 

[jwenting]

imo mesh boobs and butts aren't worth it. You can get a nice looking shape without them, in fact without them you're likely to look more natural, and have no trouble getting your skin and clothes to match up...

Skins? I've been using Hush for the last year almost, haven't regretted it. Wow skins also seems nice. Most others have on my computer a sickly yellow/orange cast over them, might be my graphics (on my laptop I see it far less).

Hair? Catwa, Exxess, and Magika are my favourites.

[Marianne Little]

Curio is back after a hiatus due to a long and sad story. I woun't go into detail but the case is resolved and her three latest skins come with all appliers.

While we can agree that the avatar works well enough without the replacement parts, there is one part that is so ugly that I can't stand to see the default part. Feet. :matte-motes-sick:

Since you been away only one year, you remember false feet and all the talk about tinting? It was "Frankenfeet" talk, avatars would snap pictures of others with badly matched feet and put out in blogs...

But the new thing is the applier, that apply the skin texture on the mesh replacement parts. No more fiddling with HUD's and trying to pick color under cursor. The big thing here is Slink feet, because it is possible to make add-on shoes for them. So you match feet once with the applier, and then just add shoes and take them off as you would in RL! This is what all the applier buzz started with.

Others has gone in a different direction, having a library of colors ready so you wear the feet with shoes and then go to a website and pick your skin... Glam Affair in Europa, just to name one. Click the button and the color is sent to SL and stored in your shoes HUD. Click the HUD tab and the script does all the work. :matte-motes-big-grin: Gos and N-Core both offer this. I avoid shoes with the old colormatching to skin system.

[D0RKiiiE]

There are actually alot of popular skin stores! I'll name a few that I know are pretty popular.

Essences, Birdy, The Shops, Deeses, DeeTalez, Glam Affair, Modish, League and there are some others, my mind is just totally blank right now. But I know a lot of people shop at those nowadays.

And for hair:

MAG, Due, Little Bones, Leverocci (Marketplace), ISON (Marketplace), Laviere, Exile, Lelutka, Truth, Magika, D!va, Dura Girl, Eaters Coma, 69, Chemistry, Fashionably Dead, Lamb, Clawtooth, Faenzo (Marketplace), Dela just to name a few that I know are pretty popular and there are many many others ofcourse.

[Zanna Zadark]

I found Truth hair to be some of the best hair in secondlife =)