Of rocks and ruins

Another month, and another weekend fiddling around with the home island (we’ll get there one day…!). I’m not entirely sure how it all started, other than thinking the “bath house” ruin on the mid-level of the island looked in need of something. So, up went additional walls, a shifting of a few things, and so matters snowballed a bit 🙂 .

The result is that the ruin with the bath is now the remains of a fair-sized 2-storey structure which now contains the steps linking the upper and mid levels of the island, making things a lot tidier. This in turn allowed the water feature on this level to be revised, with new shorter board walks making it easier to cross the water and leaving it more open. Some additional tweaks to the waterfalls improved things a little more as well, offering a more natural flow through from the main pool.

As someone asked me after I last wrote about the island, the main component used in building the ruins has been Rya Nitely’s mesh Medieval Ruins. Available as either a pack sold through his SL Marketplace presence or via his in-world store, the various parts can also be purchased individually in-world as well. I like these as they are modifiable, and so can be both resized (with care, where doorways are concerned) and re-textured to fit with most designs. They can also be easily tweaked here and there with the addition of a prim or two.

Rya’s pieces aren’t the only elements I’ve used to create the ruins, but they are the most numerous. Alongside of them, and equally invaluable in bringing things together, has been Alex Bader’s Lush and Enchanted Wall texture pack. This has allowed me to give a (largely) uniform stone wall finish to all of the various part of the ruins, which also include (as I’ve mentioned in the past) Kriss Lehmann’s beautiful Forest Ruins Tower, together with Reid Parkin’s Mesh Ruins and the .:BTH:. Medieval Ruined Chapel (which I’ve extensively modified).

One part of Rya’s set which has come in handy this time around is the stone flooring segment. I’ve always been a little bit bugged by the layout of the lower section of the ruins, and the stone flooring segments have provided the means to solve the problem. So we now have a flagstone courtyard linking the island entrance with the chapel and tower stairs, as well as providing a home for the old well.

The stone flooring has also allowed us to better integrate the Trompe Loeil Rustic Pavilion, thanks to a quick swap-out of the latter’s base for some prims to give it a suitable finish. With a footpath of nicely uneven (as with age and settlement) stone slabs, the lowest level of the island now looks more like a complete whole, rather than an assortment of bits occupying the same space.

The finishing touch came via a suggestion from Caitlyn: adding ivy to help break-up the stone walls and give a further sense of age. Once again, Kriss Lehmann had just what we needed, with vines “borrowed” from the Forest Ruins Tower which, with a little reshaping and rotation, fitted well with the “bath house”, towers and the chapel.

So is this it finally for the island? Well, we do still have the upper level lawn to think about. Caitlyn has already suggest a croquet court might be in order – so who knows 🙂 .