I think calling it status clothing is misleading. I've never seen anyone's Hoorenbeek clothing admired. Their shoes, yes. Garments? Never. There are much better quality men's items available in that price range.

Example: Say you pay 60k USD for a Suzuki sedan because someone on a blog said it was a status item and you believed them. Anyone who hears you brag about your 60k Suzuki sedan is going to laugh at you. Hard. Until their juice comes out their nose. Spend your 60k on a Mercedes Benz or a BMW and you won't even need to say what it cost. They'll see the buttery leather seats, the top of the range speakers, hear that amazing master engineered engine purring, and they'll KNOW.

The same applies to Hoorenbeek clothing vs Muism or any of the other relatively pricey brands making high quality men's "classic look" clothing. If I wear a Hoorenbeek outfit, chances are no one is going to admire the quality and tell me how amazing my outfit is. That would necessitate a "Hey! Look at me! I spent 2k on this!" That would lead to headscratching and guffaws from people who actually read men's fashion blogs or have ever been shopping at all in SL.

As for their shoes, they look amazing. Two caveats: any fashionista with common sense will look at them and say, "Have you ever heard of color change scripting?" Also, when SL finally gets off its ass and starts coming down on in-world "designers" who duplicate RL products exactly, all those Nikes, Converse, Asics, et cetera bearing the (hilarious, considering how little personal creativity was used) Hoorenbeek tag will be gone or at the least removed from the market.

To Ansor Hoorenbeek: I was reading with an open mind until you began to remind us all how amazing (you)r products are. Now it sounds like you're arrogantly missing the point of our questions and concerns. None of us thought you and your SuperSuccessfulBusiness couldn't afford the prize...we just thought from your somewhat shady, uncommunicative attitude towards all this that you didn't want to fork over. We knew you were good for it; we just didn't know if you were honorable.

Some more thoughts: if your clothing items were available on all layers and we were allowed to use more than the two (if I recall correctly) non-Hoorenbeek accessories allotted, we might be able to do more with your products. As it is, we're very limited in the way we can wear your garments because you didn't choose to make them on every layer which, considering what you charge for them, is hard to forgive. If you want innovation, either allow more outside items or make what you have more versatile.

p.s. If you're always praising yourself and talking about how busy and important you are, there's no inclination from other people to praise you; you already seem to have it covered.

Sadly, I think you're right. I just wish that we had so many multicultural and multiracial fashion shows in SL that this didn't even show up on our radar.

Iawtc.

I think expanding the definition of "beauty" is a great thing wherever it happens.

"As proclaiming about African-American...hmm why must be African-American? What happen to those in Europe or Asia or Australia."

That's what I said. Even if it was a language and time zone issue, I can only imagine there are plenty of black non-American SLers who speak English with an acceptable degree of mastery and could be available at the agreed upon time.

My question is: why the emphasis on African *Americans*? I find the nationalism a bit exclusionary... That more than the emphasis on black designers and models troubles me. I would think most especially someone who claims to be Asian would appreciate that the world is more than just the US. Perhaps they simply did not think through how their phrasing would sound.

Well said, Heidi.

I just browsed back through here and saw this, and I wanted to say that this is an amazingly cute outfit. Well done.

Exactly. Sometimes Felicity is amazingly cute. She's shown in the past that she can really style an adorable outfit. All we're hoping is that she'll promote more of the cute, fresh, non-hookery outfits instead of the see-through/skelt/two-sizes-too-small/visible-underwear thing. She's got the inventory, and she's got the eye. We just want to see her at her best.