taylor titmouse
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tourmaline and angre design tweaks
🕑 Added 2024-01-28 17:16:37 +0000 UTCas sometimes happens when writing a book, the characters and the lore shift from what you initially conceptualized, so you gotta adjust for it. i recently wrote about dwarf gender and culture over on retrospring, mostly as a way to clarify angre's relationship with it, but also to justify the way i designed tourmaline as being high femme when dwarves aren't really Known for that, and i don't want to just handwave it as "she's a woman!" and not play with dwarf gender.
high class dwarves are all about ostentatious displays of wealth, and your hair is a huge part of that. for one thing, having long and luxurious head hair is fashionable for any gender, but so is shaving/waxing your body hair and face. it demonstrates you have the time to do so regularly, and/or the money to pay someone to do it for you. and if you're going to go to all that effort, you're going to wear clothes that show it off. thus, no sleeves, high slits to show off the legs, and low cut collars to display the chest. this outfit is her travel look, the minimum amount of flashy she's willing to accept. at home, she would be wearing much more jewelry, her clothes would have even more embroidery, and she may even show the stomach. this is her being subtle.
and the adjustments to angre were largely just to make his outfit more practical for the sort of traveling they're doing. originally he had plate and mail but in the book they're trying not to draw too much attention to themselves (or at least he isn't) so leather armor and padding feels more appropriate. angre's smooth face is due to genetics, being that he's half human. he has plenty of body hair otherwise and doesn't shave it. as far as dwarf beauty standards go, he's not particularly attractive Or unattractive, though his extra height is a plus. we'll say average with room for improvement if he took better care of his hair and dressed nice.
Comments
TT
oh certainly! while smooth is what's in fashion in tourmaline's time, doing anything with one's hair that establishes you have a lot of spare time to do it would read in a similar way. like if you want to keep your beard, having it done up in complicated braids would still be seen as very high class
Lilith Dyke
loving these designs! have you considered patterned body hair as a part of dwarven body decor? im a sucker for heart-shaped chest hair
