Meet "Bryan"...

Hey everyone...

It's certainly been a while since I've posted anything here. April and May were rather busy months for me in SL as well as RL. As many of you know, we had our "Ancient Pleasures" party over at our Warehouse Plaza location. Those of you went know it was a rousing success. I'd like to thank the IronWorks Staff, DJ Gregster Kidd, and all of our wonderful guests for making it possible :)









Another activity which kept me busy was the construction of our new Agape Mainstore (more on that in a future post). It turned out rather nicely if I do say so myself and I'm very pleased with it. So far we've had almost 140 visitors at that location and I haven't even begun promoting it properly yet. Thanks for all your support!



Now we get to the main subject of this post - our latest shape, "Bryan". Standing 2.3 meters tall, "Bryan" has just about everything a guy could want in a shape... clean-cut good looks, a beefy yet not overly muscled body, and well balanced proportions. Well, don't just take my word for it. As they say, a picture's worth a thousand words...









Designed for Signature Skins' new "Ocean" line of skins, this shape is perfect for those who want to create a surfer boy or college jock look. Bryan hit the shops last night and is here just in time for your Summertime makeovers, so head on down and pick up a demo.



Til next time...

-Zim

PS: The shape is out at all shops except Aussieboys and HnH. Here's the SLURL to our Mainstore if you'd like to see "Bryan" for yourself..

http://slurl.com/secondlife/Creamy%20Shores/80/106/23

"Ancient Pleasures" party @ Warehouse Plaza

Howdy folks,


It's been months since we first opened our store at the fabulous Warehouse Plaza, but what many of you did not know is that it's now in a different location there. We started off in a tiny spot near the entrance to what is now the Hothouse Plaza sim, but just after the holidays we moved to "Judgement Square" on the other side of the Warehouse Plaza sim near the entrance to Folsom Plaza. Sound confusing? It isn't really. In fact to help you find it, we're hosting a huge party at our new Warehouse Plaza Agape store :-)










We've named the party "Ancient Pleasures" in a nod to ancient Greece and to better fit our L$1500 contest theme of "Best in Silks". What better way to show off your bod than with a Silks contest? DJ Gregster Kidd will be on hand to serve up the hot tunes while our guests groove and gyrate to the hot beats. My best buddy Gilgalahad Gunsberg (no relation) has built us a spectacular set to party on complete with a giant statue of Atlas holding the world on his shoulders. The party will run from 1 - 3PM SLT on Saturday, April 18th so that our European friends will be able to join us for this truly special event.

All the elements are in place for an afternoon (or evening) to remember... the only thing missing is you! Mark your calendars and TP on down to party with us!

See you there!
-Zim

Agape @ Warehouse Plaza: http://slurl.com/secondlife/Warehouse%20Plaza/165/244/23

OMG! We've been Blogged!

Eddi and Jago over at the "Sex Aficionado" blog have done a review of our "Marcello" shape. although this is one of our older shapes, it continues to be a favorite of our customers. Hop on over and check it out!



Sex Aficionado Blog: http://sexaficionado.blogspot.com/2009/04/agape-marcello-mens-shape.html

"Evan" hits the shops!

Howdy, folks!



We've had another crazy weekend with the opening of the Cherry Park and Emerald locations (we managed to crash the sim at Emerald with 80 people!), but on Sunday I managed to get some time to myself and get our latest shape out to the shops. "Evan" is something a little bit new for me. He's another in the "Signature Series", using a "Vain" skin and hair from a new creator I discovered by accident. In case anyone's wondering, Evan is wearing a unisex top from Fishy Strawberry and Armidi jeans. Yes, I fought the crippling lag with Zann to go and pick these up one evening.







The focus this time was on making him as 'real' looking as I could rather than making him 'pretty' or giving him a GQ face. I tried to give him a body that a real guy would have rather than an idealized SL body that you see around the Grid so often. Hopefully I've succeeded in this. Only time will tell for sure. Traffic in the shops has been up lately and a number of guys have already picked up the Demo version.














So yes, if you've been waiting for a fresh, realistic boyish look this is the time to head on down to your favorite Agape location and pick up a Demo. If you already have a "Vain" skin from Signature skins in your inventory you're all set to be a dude-magnet (or a Chick-magnet) in no time ::winks::



Till next time!

-Zim

"Trevor (Gen II)"

The whirlwind of activity has finally subsided. Last Saturday's grand re-opening of our new Mainstore was a fantastic success (and it was a whole lot of fun!!), the grand opening of the Shops at Jake's Club Resort turned out fantastic, and our newest location out at the Cherry Park mall went into 'soft opening' mode without a hitch. Once things had quieted down a bit, I took a look at my Workshop folder in inventoryand noticed that another shape was sitting there unfinished, so I went into 'busy mode' for a while and finished packaging up old "Trevor II".



"Why 'Trevor II'?" you ask? Well the original 'Trevor' shape was one of the first sold in our shop. At that point in time I was still rushing to get things done so I could get them out on the sales floor, and in all honesty I don't think I did poor old Trevor justice. What has changed since then? Well, we now have the fantastic line of Signature skins to work with and the 'Rage' skin looked like it would be perfect for giving old Trev a makeover. Here's a pic of the new and improved "Trevor"...





So just what did I do to him? A number of things actually... I made him just a wee bit beefier and taller - not too much, though. I still wanted him to have a lean, lanky look, but this time I wanted to give him a bit of a bad boy edge. Once I had his body sorted I went on to re-scuplt his head and face. Again, I didn't want to make him into something completely new - I just wanted to improve on what I'd already started. To tell the truth, the original Trevor was looking a little bit Muppety and I wanted to make him look more 'real'.





Once he had the 'Rage' skin on I gave him fuller lips and sculpted them a bit more to give a bit of a pout to them and shifted his mouth upwards a bit. Also, I refined his nose so that the nostrils were better placed and narrowed his eyes just a tad. Trevor's jaw and nose were also fined down considerably and his face made slightly longer to accentuate the new cheekbones I'd given him.


I know it sounds like I did quite a bit to him, but really all I did was use the Signature skin as a guide in making him more natural-looking. He's currently out in all the shops except the Romeo store, so head on down and try on a wearable demo. I'm very pleased with the way he's turned out and he's certain to give you a unique, sexy look.




Until next time!

-Zim

The Return of DJ Kadie

Not that she was ever completely gone, mind you. Last Summer, one of our personal faves, DJ Kadie Pinkenba decided to take a little time off to try a little game known as WoW. At the time she told me, "I'm sure I won't be playing for long, " thinking to herself "I'll just give it a little try and be back soon. It can't be THAT addictive." Well several months and several high-level characters later, DJ Kadie is back and she's in top form.






It pleases me to announce that the one and only DJ Kadie is back and will be playing at the Agape Mainstore's Grand Opening at Gaytown Mall this Saturday, March 14th from 1 - 3pm SLT. The store is ready (and it truly is something special, folks) and all that's missing is your presence. Please do plan to attend as this really looks like it's going to be a very special afternoon of entertainment. The store has moved 2 doors down, so be sure to update your LM's. You can find us here:



http://slurl.com/secondlife/The%20Highlander/89/86/578



See you Saturday!



-Zim

Hot Boots

Yep they sure are! I bought them a while ago and wore them a few times, but only recently have I begin to realize just how well these boots are made. They're sculpties of course, so they will take a little while to rez (particularly the toe section for some reason - but baybee... once they've rezzed - Phwoarr! I proclaim these to be the hottest cowboy boots on the grid. Take a look at these puppies...

They're called "Catbash boots" and I suppose they're intended as some sort of Neko paraphernalia, but you certainly don't have to be Neko to wear or appreciate them. the level of detail is pretty astounding if you ask me. the scripted bandana around the right ankle is a great touch, but IMO it would have been great if the colors available weren't all similar. Still at about L$480 they're a great value - not only because they look spectacular, but because 5 sizes are included. That's pretty awesome in my book.

You can find the "Catbash" boots at WMD.

http://slurl.com/secondlife/Schreckhorn/14/95/37

Hasta la proxima, baby!

-Zim

"Miles to go before I sleep..."

That about sums it up, folks. February was a wild and interesting month, Agape-wise. We moved our HnH store over to the new Sim, opened our new store at Jake's Club Resort (more on that later), and began work on our new "Mainstore" at Gaytown Mall. The Gaytown Mall store is really going to be something to see once it's done. John and Gully were kind enough to offer us a bigger home, and even though I was nervous about being able to fill up a space that large, I accepted, took the plunge, and ordered more prims (lol).



We've also been given a new, larger space over at Warehouse Plaza and that location is coming along quite nicely. Not as large or elaborate as the Gaytown Mall 'Mainstore' will end up being, but it's still something to see. This isn't what this blog post is about, however. Not really. Today I'm announcing the release of our two first "Signature Series Shapes", Ian and Nikita...

I'm very proud of how these guys turned out. "Ian" was designed around the "Rage" skin and Nikita around my personal fave, the "Blaze" skin. Some of you are probably wondering what it means to design a shape around a skin. 'Aren't all skins the same?' you are probably asking yourselves. "Not really," would be the answer. Sure, all skins are based on a Linden template, but that where the similarities end. Each skin creator has their own personal style which dictates placement of the eyes, fullness and shading of the lips, and things like how strong or subtle the shading and highlights are among other things.

The "Ian" and "Nikita" shapes were designed to take advantage of the particular strengths of Skins found at Signature Skins as well as the placement of facial features, etc. The end result is a set of shapes that offer a level of realism missing from the body shapes of many other creators. I honestly don't think you'll find other guys wearing shapes that look as "real" as these do anywhere on the Grid. Be sure to stop by one of our shops and pick up a wearable demo, then hop on over to Signature Skins and pick up a demo skin and put them both on. I think you are going to be very pleasantly surprised at how you look and that you'll be back to pick up the full versions soon afterward.

We do have more shapes in this series coming out soon, so be sure to check the blog or visit us in-world so as not to miss out on any of them...

http://slurl.com/secondlife/The%20Highlander/90/85/578

Ciao!

-Zim

The Cat is out of the Bag...

Yep, I can finally talk about this it seems :)

Some of you may already know about this, but Jake's Club has now expanded into the all new Jake's Club Resort, featuring a beautiful new Mall and an Amphitheatre for community events and Agape Men's Store is proud to be a part of it! We've got a beautiful new 450 Sq meter store there and if I do say so myself, it really looks wonderful!

The new location will feature all of our great shapes as well as the new "Agape / Signature" series of shapes designed around... Oh wait, I haven't mentioned that part yet, have I (hehe)? Well, now that the proverbial cat is out of the bag as they say, I suppose I should mention this. You may remember that earlier in the month I'd blogged about the shopping experience a friend of mine had when I sent him over to Signature Skins for a "Blaze" skin. Since then, I've been in contact with Mr Spad and he has graciously allowed me to design a line of Male body Shapes around his fantastic skins. You've really got to see these to believe them!

The "Signature Series" shapes are designed around three specific skins from Mr Spad's collection - "Blaze", "Rage", and "Vain". You really owe it to yourself to check these out. The shapes themselves have not yet been released, but you can check out previews of them at our Jake's Club Resort, Gaytown Mall, and Warehouse Plaza locations; or better yet, head on down to Signature Skins and try out demo's of the skins themselves. You will be amazed at the level of realism Mr Spad has achieved with these skins - and once you've worn them with one of our new shapes, well... I'll be surprised if you wear much else for quite some time (I think you know what I'm talking about here ::grins::).

The Shops at Jake's Club Resort is currently in "Soft Opening" mode, but watch for the "Grand Opening" announcement to appear sometime next week. We have a few more announcements to make over the next few weeks so keep watching this spot for updates!

See you soon!

-Zim

The sound of Silence...

Well, it's been pretty quiet around here these past few says, hasn't it? This usually means I'm working on something :) In this case it just so happens that I'm working on several things at once. Eight things to be precise, but they're all inter-related (sp?).

Unfortunately I can't talk about them just yet, but soon (very soon) I'll be able to spill the beans about at least one of them. Trust me, this is going to be very cool. All I can say right now is that part of this announcement involves 5 new Male Body Shapes I've been working on (one of which is pictured here).

It's really hard for me to keep quiet about this because it's pretty big (to me, anyway) and involves LOTS of prims... Oops, shouldn't have let that part slip. OK, I'll shut up now; but keep watching this space. I really think you're going to love this...

Soon, very soon...

-Zim

PS: It's just come to my attention that there is something ELSE going on! OMG... Can't say more now (I'm under SLNDA), but soon I'll be posting more on this as it happens. Stay tuned...

Romeo's Best Kept Secret

Nestled away in a corner of the Aussieboys' hangout on the Romeo sim lies a little Agape Men's Store location. It features almost all of our great Men's body shapes (which is no small feat considering this is our smallest location).

So if you happen to be Sim-hopping on the Mainland, be sure to stop in and visit. The Mall features lots of great shops including Pillow Biters, Dinzeo Design, Xcite!, and 'N4RS...

The store can be found here:

http://slurl.com/secondlife/Romeo/99/211/40

See you soon (and be ready for our next big announcement :-)

Have a great weekend!

-Zim

Kudos!

No picture with this entry. I just wanted to take this opportunity to mention an awesome example of an SL content creator helping their customers to solve problems. Recently a friend of mine went to Signature Skins for one of their "Blaze" skins (which is very hot IMO). Basically what happened is that once he bought the skin, the SL asset servers ate it. I'm sure many of you know how frustrating that can be.

What did he do? Well, to his credit he didn't freak out. He went through the usual steps one should take in order to try and retrieve the item. He used the search and filtering functions to make sure the folder/skin was not still in his inventory somehwere. He also cleared his cache and re-logged, hoping that this might bring the item back. When it was clear that his purchase was really, truly gone from his inventory, he took a deep breath and proceeded to write a calm factual non-accusatory notecard detailing what had happened and sent it off to the creator, Simple Spad - including the details of his transaction from the LL web site.

By the time my friend had gotten home from work yesterday, Mr Spad had refunded the purchase price of the missing item and my friend was able to TP over to Signature Skins and re-buy the product that SL had eaten... and I must say he looks pretty damned good. So Kudos to Simple Spad of Signature Skins! Not only are his skins pretty awesome (and reasonably priced), but he takes the time to help out his customers when SL has a hiccup. This alone makes a world of difference and we are pleased to be able to recommend this vendor as a place to shop.

Ciao!

-Zim

Bad Hair Day

Recently I've been seeing an interesting new hairstyle floating around the clubs. Admittedly it's not everyone's cup of tea, but it evoked the 80's for me and looked cute on the AVI's I saw sporting it. The style is called "Silvio 2" and it's available from a content creator whose shop is fairly famous for its (ladies') creations. I won't name any names here, but hopefully someone attached to the store / hair will see this and fix the damn thing. Look at this hair...

As if shopping for good hair / skin / clothing as a guy in SL is not bad enough, try doing it as a blonde some time. You tend to run across things like this. Can you see what I'm talking about? Would you pay almost L$300 for something as bad as this? Are you filled with outrage? Probably not, but this *is* bad hair any way you slice it. Of course the Demo picture in her shop shows the hair from the other side (and in black) so not everyone will get treated to this example of shoddy craftsmanship - at least not right away. Oh, also... the hair is scripted resize (which I hate) and the store is one big 'no script zone' for your convenience.

Caveat emptor, baby...

-Zim

"Nick"

This will be the first of my posts about one of my body shapes. I thought it would be appropriate to start with one of the first created, the one I named "Nick".

Originally I wanted to create sort of an 'ethnic' shape - one that evoked an attactive man of Mediterranean descent... Not specifically Greek or Italian, but one that could kind of go either way. When he was finished I spent a few days kicking around names until Gil finally decided that "Nick" would be best.

One of the things I wanted to do was focus on his nose and eyes, to give him a classic, yet rugged look - to make him beautiful, yet approachable at the same time. I wanted to stay away from the doe-eyed 'prettiness' that is so cliche and give him a friendly face that ordinary guys could relate to, yet find attractive. The not-too-full lips and squarish jaw line finished off the effect that I was going for. Once I had rounded his features a bit to make them less extreme, I knew that I had achieved what I was going for.

Next I chose a skin from Millage Valenti (approx L$2000 - I'm doing this from memory here) with a nice tanned texture that gave his facial features more depth without looking 'painted'. The triangular highlight area around the eyes, nose, and cheekbones worked perfectly to bring out the angularity of his face without looking harsh. Also, ths skin has some nice body highlighting that gives him a bit of a wiry muscularity that looks very male without making him look like a gymrat. The skin also includes a facelight that while good for photos, contains too many prims for use while travelling about the grid. As we all know, the SL client is only capable of rendering a total of 6 light sources. I believe that this facelight has a total of 7.

Once "Nick" was named and ready, I had to dress him for his photo shoot. For this I chose clothing from Brutal Gear. In keeping with my initial concept for the body shape, I chose something that would give him a masculine, yet comfortable lived-in look. I can't remember the prices off the top of my head right now (although I do promise to be more precise about this in the future), but the "Tread" tank top was under L$100 and the "Rebar" jeans were about L$125. Nick's Hair is from "Truth", and the color is Raven I do believe. This particular style goes for about L$250 and more than one shade of black is included.

The "Nick" body shape is available at all Agape Men's Store locations and sells for L$500 No Mod/Copy/No Trans. Both regular and "0" size feet versions are included as is an Agape (1 prim) facelilght and Styling Card.

So yeah...

Well I suppose that I have a bit of catching up to do now that I'm here. Where to begin? Let's see...


I opened my first Agape store last Summer in the mall outside of Romeo Reardon's Club Athens on the Thesoloniki sim (Unfortunately the store, the mall, and the whole Sim are no longer there). I started off with just 4 shapes (LOL), but I was damned proud of my little storefront and would spend hours just shifting things around, trying to make things look a bit interesting, but once I had a few more shapes under my belt it became clear that I'd need to expand. Soon after that an opportunity became available to open a location at Gaytown Mall.


John and Gully were in the process of renovating and expanding the mall, so I jumped at the chance and ended up with a wonderfully huge space with windows on 3 sides that would prove to shape the "look" for the other stores that were to follow. Even though the mall and that store have been redesigned yet again, Gaytown Mall is still my favorite location to date. I consider it to be my 'mainstore' even though I don't really have a 'mainstore' in the conventional sense.


Other stores in other malls would follow, leading to a total of five stores and one vendor Kiosk over at Impulse Isle. I've met a lot of interesting people and learned a lot of interesting things over these past 7 months (wow, it seems a lot longer sometimes) and I do have another new store in the works, which looks to be a very interesting place. I guess you could say I'm sort of addicted to opening shops; however after this new one opens I believe I'm going to just settle down for a while and concentrate on expanding my line. I'm in no hurry, and the slider combinations are infinite, so I can just focus on making you look as good as possible. See you at the malls!


-Zim

Greetings and Salutations!

Hi there! My name's Zim Gunsberg and I'm an avatar in the Virtual World called Second Life.

I'm not a Fashionista by any means, but I do have a better than average eye for what looks good. I'm also the owner of the Agape Men's Store, where I sell male body shapes. Yeah, that does sound kind of strange, but this is a Virtual World we're talking about here - You can pretty much be anything you care to be. Face it, guys like looking good; and more often than not, they'd prefer to do it without having to spend an arm and a leg.

When I first got to Second Life I was pretty overwhelemed with all the choices available. I was also overwhelmed by the sheer amount of custom content available for women and the scarcity of good custom content for men. I thought, "Do guys not play Second Life? I see other guys here. They must get their clothes somewhere? Where can I find some cool stuff?"

After getting situated, I made it my mission to make my AVI look as hot as I could (hehe, that's me in the pic up there); so I dragged my buddies Gil and Trent around with me to just about every shop I could find and tried on as many things as I could until I thought I looked reasonably hot. This was back when the club DevilInside was the hottest gay nightspot on the Grid. I'd actually plan my outfits before heading on over, just waiting to show off the clothes and hair I'd found, and to see what everyone else was wearing (Shout outs here to Karmelle and Trent and Hartmann and Gil and Willi and Clarkie and everyone else; you all know who you are - and you all looked FAB... all the time! Muah!)

At this point you're probably wondering about my fashion creds. Trust me, I have none - other than visiting London in the 80's and having worked in the Theatre as a costume and scenic designer for 12 years (that's IRL, btw). So do I "know" fashion? No, but I've got a good eye for what looks 'right' on the male body. Being a homo helps a lot (wink wink), but don't let that scare you off if you're a straight guy reading this.

Everyone deserves to look good. Everyone. Agape is an unconditional love, and that's what my store and blog are all about. i'm not going to tell you how to look, but I will present some interesting ideas and images here, and hopefully you may walk away with something useful (or at least have been entertained by my scribblings). Hasta la proxima...

-Zim