Gothic BJD Tales: Edgar Allan Poe's "The Bridal Ballad"

The ring is on my hand, 
   

And the wreath is on my brow; 


Satin and jewels grand 


Are all at my command, 
   

And I am happy now

And my lord he loves me well; 
   

But, when first he breathed his vow, 


I felt my bosom swell— 


For the words rang as a knell, 
   

And the voice seemed his who fell 


In the battle down the dell, 
   

And who is happy now

But he spoke to re-assure me, 
    

And he kissed my pallid brow, 


While a reverie came o'er me, 


And to the church-yard bore me, 


And I sighed to him before me, 


Thinking him dead D'Elormie, 


"Oh, I am happy now!"

And thus the words were spoken, 
    

And this the plighted vow, 


And, though my faith be broken, 


And, though my heart be broken, 


Here is a ring, as token 
    

That I am happy now

Would God I could awaken! 


For I dream I know not how! 


And my soul is sorely shaken 


Lest an evil step be taken,— 


Lest the dead who is forsaken 
    

May not be happy now

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Notes:  This is my interpretation of theme IV of the Edgar Allan Poe photography challenge that I mentioned in my last entry.  I hadn't planned to illustrate the whole poem, but once I uploaded my pictures, a photostory seemed the best way to show the movement from superficial safety to real or imagined danger.   

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Tea Time

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Hello, dear and lovely readers!  After a long hiatus, I am back with some new pictures.  Eric and Emilia decided to have tea outside yesterday.  If you will observe carefully, they now have croissants and macarons.   

I have two or three things that I shall be quite excited to share here-- so, while this is a short post with casual pictures, meant to ease us out of hiatus, there will be more to come, hopefully before the end of the month.  :0)

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Soom, Dollmore, and Iplehouse

Well now, I thought I would do something a little different.  My three favourite ABJD companies have all turned some truly gorgeous resin ladies this month.  Let us now take a look at my three favourite things for March 2013.  And if anything more spectacular comes out before the end of the month, I will post an appropriate reaction gif.

1. Iplehouse releases the updated EID woman body

I have the old Iplehouse EID body, and from what I can see, the updated elbows, knees, and thigh joints are much needed improvements.  "The Addiction" is the name of the new series, and Doria and Aaliyah are the first limited girls.  Iplehouse has finally succumbed to the Gothic side and is offering a vampire and a dark elf.  They seem to be set in a Vampire Hunter D sort of world, where aristocratic glamour meets modern, post-human excess. 


2.  Dollmore releases Trinity Doll Elysia

I never really liked the look of the Lusion girls, nor of Trinity Doll Jude.  Certainly, I have seen collectors do beautiful things with the Lusion girls, and Jude was conceptually ambitious enough to earn my admiration-- but Elysia, Violet Letter Knife, is the only one of these exceptionally large dolls to actually strike me as beautiful.  Her 1830s-inpsired dress is unusually elegant and lady-like, and I think that Gu mi-jeong did a fantastic job of making a large-scale head that is interesting but not too uncanny.

3.  Soom releases Garnet No. 0320

As far as I know, this is Soom's first attempt to make a cyborgian BJD.  There have been many other successful versions of cyborgs from other companies, and I have generally found the cyborg aesthetic to work naturally with the ball-jointed doll aesthetic.  Soom's contribution to this type of doll is no exception.  Garnet's artificiality is styled in a subtle manner.  The lines of her body are mainly clean (aside from the nonfunctional pins near her hips and elbows) and Soom has made the minimalist choice of barely blushing these lines.  The result is sleek, sophisticated, and leaves ample room for the imagination of customizers.

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When I let the water take me [Soom Chrom]

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Notes:  Eric, my Soom Chrom, and a teddy bear.  I made a photostory about his bear a while ago, but I wanted to express more about how he feels without using words.  The title for this post comes from "What the Water Gave Me" by Florence and The Machine.  This song reminds me of a storm, and so I thought of it a lot while trying to depict Eric's own inner storm.  I'm sorry some of the pictures were compressed in a blocky way, it wasn't something I noticed until they were uploaded. :-/

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