There’s a well-known joke about London buses: “You wait for ages and then three come along together”. I have waited for over a decade to see male heeled feet in Second Life, and in the past year or so we’ve had almost an embarrassment of riches: the heeled foot option on Signature Davis, the Maze Tiptoes heeled feet add-on for Belleza Jake, the heeled feet options on CZ Slim, the Frisky add-on high feet for Belleza Jake, the Things Heeled Feet for Signature and Slink, Riot’s Trixie Heeled Socks (designed to be worn with Maitreya-rigged shoes), Sibilla’s ‘feet included’ heels, the heeled feet on MaleDiction’s new Anatomy male body, and now – finally – we have not one, but five heeled foot options for the Legacy Male body, with their new v1.6 update. (Note: This is only for the main Legacy male lines, including Legacy Athletic. The L$1 Legacy ‘Classic’ male body does not have this update and therefore will not have these foot options.)
This update caught me completely by surprise, as I’ve been pretty busy IRL this past month or so, and not keeping up with SL news. I first heard murmurings about Legacy male heeled feet a few years ago now, but since they never materialised I’d given up hope of ever seeing them. However, on logging in briefly yesterday to pick up a few “don’t want to miss this at these prices; will unpack later” bargains in the weekend sales, my Legacy body prompted me with an update popup. I accepted, unpacked the update, and… let’s just say that first there was Surprised Pikachu Face, then there was “AAAAAAAAAH!”, and lastly there was “OMG OMG OMG I NEED TO SHOP!”
Can you tell that I’ve waited bloody years for this?! ;-)
Heels have been an occasional part of Skell’s fashion identity for years, since before mesh and even since before mesh’s predecessor: sculpties. His first pair were one of those old multi-prim constructions (scrubbed of their bling script; yes they were that old!) that now sit in the freebiest of freebie warehouses, that I painstakingly spent ages resizing and editing. When sculpties appeared many things had modify permissions, so I built up a wardrobe of heeled footwear that I’d resized, from ‘feet included’ options by AHN-JI and House of Curios, to some of the many offerings by Blackburns. Then, mesh came along in 2012, and suddenly my options for good quality, current male heeled footwear just… dried up. For years, I scoured inworld and Marketplace stores, as well as events, and occasionally I managed to find something that I could work with. Invariably, it would contain female rigs only, but it would be created in such a way that it didn’t make Skell’s feet look comically small compared to the rest of his body.
A few creators stood out. Cubura’s heeled boots for Slink and Signature were the first pair of male-rigged mesh footwear that I found, and I wore the hell out of them. Occasional other male-rigged gems came from the likes of Boys to the Bone, L’Emporio&PL and Static, but they were always boots because a heeled male foot just didn’t exist.
Second from left in the above image are the Maze Tiptoes for Jake; the first actual heeled male foot add-on that got picked up by a small handful of creators.
I created Skell’s bishonen persona, Syd, using Maitreya Lara and first the V-Tech and then the Maitreya Flat add-on option. Having him has been great, as it’s enabled me to continue with the heels in some form. But I have really missed being able to wear heels on Skell himself. (BTW, Skell and Syd are the same account, with a humungous shared inventory.)
So here we are now, with one of the biggest mesh body brands on the grid finally updating to include male heeled feet, and I couldn’t be happier. What’s more, they’ve launched this with some other creators onboard, so there are already shoes and boots created for (or updated to include) these heel heights. Scroll to the end of this post for a link to more info.
So, what’s included with the new update? You get five foot options: Low, Mid, High, Ouch!, and Pointe:
They look like this:
Simply wear the pair you want (make sure that your body’s feet are not hidden in the alpha cut section of the Legacy Edit HUD) and the flat feet of the body will autohide so that only the heeled feet are showing. These feet are BoM-enabled, so any Legacy male BoM body skin will work on them. (I’ll admit that – since I’m fully BoM these days – I’ve not tried these with appliers.) You will need to wear the appropriate height of foot for your shoes, which can involve a bit of trial and error until you get used to what the heights look like. I’ve already started appending the required heel height to the end of the footwear’s folder name, to make it a bit easier.
The toenails will be hidden by default, unless you choose to show them either via the body’s Edit HUD or via chat command (a list of chat commands is included in notecard format in the body’s folder). If you’re wearing heeled footwear that covers the toes, you’ll want the nails hidden, otherwise they might float above your shoes. But if you’re wearing open-toed footwear, make sure the toenails are showing. They will take the same nail applier option that you choose from the Legacy Edit HUD for your fingernails. And, if you want something a little extra (since I don’t believe the Legacy nail applier scripting issue has been resolved yet?) there’s already a set of add-on toenails for all the male foot heights, from 2faces (shown in the image at the top of this post, and in closer detail below).
Find the initial release footwear collaborations currently at the meshbody.com homepage, and keep an eye on the Legacy Releases Flickr pool for any new items. Here’s just a handful of what I picked up this weekend:
Footwear creators who already rig for Legacy female bodies, please consider picking up the male rigging kit! There are a surprising number of men out there who have been waiting for good heels for a long time. Many of us wear them for fashion reasons (and, of course, some wear them for fetish reasons) so it’s a large, untapped market out there.
Style Credits for main image
Shoes: Astara – Strappy Heels (Legacy M & F, CZ Slim, Maze Jake Tiptoes, Frisky Jake High Feet, Maitreya, Reborn)
Toenails: 2faces – Shameless Nails (Legacy v1.6 – heeled feet)
Pants: Malediction – Kael Chaps & Shorts (sold separately – Legacy, Jake, CZ Slim)
Jacket: Deadsouls – Sludge (Legacy, Jake, CZ Slim)
Stole: Fakeicon – Jeane Ruffle Stole (PVC black)
Eyewear: Majesty – Mirror Shades (black)
Hair: Modulus – Raf
Chair: Midwest – Recklest Chair
Funny in SL as in RL what was old is now new again. When SL started using alpha layers I found that I could use some women’s shoes that had feet with my male body. It was a great thing for a Drag Queen to discover! I used Viktoria von Brandenburg’s sexy shoes and still do with my mesh avatars. You can find them at http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Armaud/48/225/26
Lot’s of <3 Merlot
Absolutely! I remember doing the same thing when I could find ‘foot included’ shoes that had modify permissions. I’ll have to check out that SLurl, thank you :-)