Atypical A-frame

About a month ago I published a post about my Meadowbrook Linden Home. This is a type of home you can chose, if you open a Second Life Premium account and use the 512 sqm of mainland you are entitled to within this scheme by taking a Linden Home. There are three more types of homes and several particular styles within these types to chose from.  If you are more into fairies, elves and wizards, you could go for an Elderglen dwelling. For those that like the look and feel of colourful Japanese gardens, there is Sahreta Osumai. And finally, the type of home we will be looking at now, can be found in the Tahoe district.

It took some serious real estate hunting to find this rustic cabin retreat with open space on two sides. This A-frame house is right on the corner of a Tahoe lot and in the distance I can see some Elderglen and Meadowbrook houses, which makes this one of the more interesting Linden Home areas to explore. All the A-frame houses come as one big open space and just as with my Meadowbrook house, I was greeted by an underwhelming fireplace and texture choices that left much to be desired.

After browsing through the various standard textures that can be applied to this house via the access panel located at the front door, I eventually settled on a neutral cream stucco with wooden beams, which seemed a natural choice for a mountain cabin. I immediately started covering the flat beams with wood-textured prims to create a more realistic 3D effect and threw down another prim to cover the shabby floor with a nice high quality parquet. With those basics out off the way, I could start focusing on the living room, which I created on the side of the house offering the nicest views. As I was going to cover up the fireplace on the other side, I installed a new one to add both a focal point and a bit of  warmth to the living room.

I was in a somewhat ambitious mood when I started decorating this house and decided that this time around I would install a kitchen. Blocking up the fireplace with a rustic polished concrete wall and creating a second and third floor, left me with a nice corner for the “Plantation” kitchen by Apple Fall, with space for a cute little wood burning stove by Lisp Bazaar and a vintage fridge by Dutchie. To be honest, I added a few more details which I usually haven’t out on display, just to make the picture look more interesting. I was down to my last prim after that! Oy vey, my nerves!

What you see in these pictures is by no means the result of a first attempt to create levels in this house. I have tried putting the staircase in the middle with a cute niche underneath it for a desk, but then I still had to come up with something else to cover that dismal fireplace.

The solution I went for in the end, gave me two extra levels instead of just one, with a corner big enough for a bathroom with a shower, washing basin and toilet, effectively pushing the realistic functionality of the house even further.

Go up a second flight of stairs and you enter the bedroom via a spacious dressing area, with a wardrobe system provided by Bazar and an oversized beanbag by Dysfunctionality, ideal for sitting down an putting on my socks with a bit of dignity or for just sitting there and staring at my wardrobe full of “nothing to wear”.

Last but not least there’s the one thing that most people manage to rez in their Second Life home: the bed. This is where the magic happens… Unless you’re too busy decorating homes, shopping, playing games, styling your avatar, chatting and discovering sims to leave much time for that kind of magic. But as you can see, some beds can help you create the illusion of working on your blog inworld as well as in real life, so either way it’s not entirely useless.

I hope this has given you some ideas of what you can do with your Linden Home, or even any kind of home you occupy in Second Life. Just try something, what’s the worst that can happen? It’s not like real life where, if you don’t like the paint you’ve just put on the wall, you have to learn to live with it for a while because paint is bloody expensive. Just have fun!