peachy and co, flufftopia mailbox

so, ways to get around this:

turn off AI results. they're literally nonsense to us

don't use pinterest because the sources/provenance is often hard to trace

a standard internet search can be okay, but museum collections are the top tier (list of collections below this list)

instead of broad terms like victorian, regency, tudor, renaissance etc. try using the decade you're looking for. if you're not sure of what decade it is but have a vague image in your head, look on the fashion history timeline and just jump around until you find it. but even changing to e.g. 19th century will give better results than victorian

including terms like womenswear/menswear, daywear, formal wear, evening wear, court dress should increase the value of your search too

including "fashion plates" in your search can give you a nice impression of the intended silhouettes of the era. some of these might be a little stylised but will show you what was considered in vogue

for pre-fashion plate eras or things like makeup and styling, you'll have to look at portraiture or manuscripts. these are harder to actually find what you're looking for, but searching museum collections and limiting results to specific date ranges will be your friend

when looking at art, do bear in mind sometimes artists would paint fabric extra flow-y to show off their skills. it might not have been exactly like that in terms of fabric weight or drape. so, a pinch of salt required!

if you find something on image search where the provenance is dubious, reverse image search and you might find a source! i've been able to trace random pinterest images to real sources, but this does take a lot of time and effort and is often not worth the headache

some online resources and museum collections:

fashion history timeline is an invaluable resource if you're trying to get a feel for everything and should be your first port of call. it'll also link to good examples

the met has a vast number of extant examples of clothing, as well as fashion plates

costume institute fashion plates is a subcollection of the met for fashion plates (1800s-1922)

v&a also has many extant garments, fashion plates, and incredible articles on clothing and aesthetics. read the details of the objects because they'll often reveal a lot about the piece

lacma is good for C19th-20th pieces

nypl digital collection for photographs

national portrait gallery or similar for portraiture, or literally any museum in your country that has historical art

national museums scotland can be useful situationally but might be oddly specific

stout style history is a great collection for finding image references for fat people wearing historical clothes. survival bias of a lot of museum pieces tends towards smaller clothing that couldn't be repurposed, but this aims to counter that. it's not sortable, but is still a really nice resource

wikimedia commons is surprisingly handy! and the images, if you should need to link/repost them, are public domain

auction websites sound like a funny one to recommend. some won't have mannequins and some will. just look up historical garment auctions and you'll find some!

Things to consider when Writing about Schools/Academies!!

⊹ What is this school actually for. training mages? knights? spies? just normal education? because "prestigious academy" means nothing if you don't know what they're prestigious at

⊹ Who gets in and how. is it merit based, do you have to be rich, legacy admissions, secret tests, random selection, born with the right abilities. what happens to kids who don't make the cut

⊹ What's the age range. are these literal children or young adults or mixed ages. because a school with 11 year olds has very different problems than one with 18 year olds

⊹ How strict is it. prison vibes with tons of rules? pretty chill? different rules for different student groups (which is unfair and causes drama)?

⊹ What are the social hierarchies. obviously there are cliques but what are they based on. wealth? power level? what year you're in? family name? talent?

⊹ What happens if you fail or get expelled. are you just sent home in shame or is it worse. do people sometimes not survive the training. how often do students drop out or disappear

⊹ Who are the teachers and why are they teaching. washed up former heroes? people who never left? actually passionate educators? suspicious people using it as a cover? mix of all of them probably

⊹ What's forbidden. certain magic, certain areas of campus, relationships between students, leaving grounds, specific books/knowledge. and obviously your protagonist will break these rules

⊹ How do students get sorted/grouped. houses? teams? specializations? randomly? and do these groups have rivalries because they should

⊹ What's the curriculum actually like. is it actually useful or are they learning weird outdated stuff. are there classes that are just covers for something else. what are the hardest classes

⊹ Where is this school located. isolated castle? middle of a city? pocket dimension? floating island? does it move? can students leave or are they stuck there

⊹ What traditions does the school have. tournaments, festivals, hazing rituals (the dark kind), graduation ceremonies, weird old customs nobody questions

⊹ Is there corruption in the faculty/administration. favoritism, taking bribes, secret agendas, covering up student deaths, embezzling, working for the villain

⊹ What's the diversity situation. is it segregated somehow (by class, species, magic type)? integrated but with tension? do some groups face discrimination from staff or other students?

⊹ What happens outside of classes. clubs? underground fight rings? secret societies? banned parties? students sneaking out? romantic drama?

─ .✦ If your villain monologues for more than two paragraphs, your hero should've escaped by now or at least checked their phone. Real people don't wait politely for evil speeches to finish. They interrupt, get bored and say things like "okay but can you get to the point I have dinner plans."

─ .✦ Stop having your characters look in mirrors to describe themselves. Your protagonist doesn't wake up and think "I looked at my reflection and saw my shoulder-length auburn hair and piercing green eyes." They think "ugh I look like death" and move on. Find literally ANY other way.

─ .✦ If every sentence in your action scene is the same length it reads like a grocery list with violence. Short punchy sentences for fast moments. Longer flowing ones when they catch their breath and realize oh god that hurt. Variety is your friend and so is rhythm.

me every time someone asks me what I write

Oh I so agree.

Anonymous asks:

I believe my question revolves around linguistics, but please correct me if there’s something I didn’t take into account. I’m an Egyptian girl who speaks Arabic (the Egyptian dialect specifically), and I am currently writing an urban fantasy set in modern day Egypt. Naturally, the characters would be speaking Egyptian arabic (i even have a scene where my character converses with a tourist and struggles to speak to them ‘in english’)  But as the story is written in english, I found this is really hard to convey, especially with the entirely different alphabet, and the words that simply cannot be transcribed (sometimes in definition, and sometimes in letters that don’t have an equivalent). What would be a good way to send the message that these characters are by no means speaking English (unless stated) without having to hold the reader's hand through lengthy descriptions of how a word is pronounced at every corner?

Hi Anon! This is a tough spot. I’m no expert, just a mod and fellow writer trying to support your fantastic ask. Any bilingual readers, especially other Arabic speakers, feel free to chime in.

1- Disclose they’re speaking Arabic, even though you’re writing in English:

Example A: “Hey, Noor! Wait up,” he said in Arabic. 

Example B: “Habibti, I haven’t seen you in a while,” she reminded me. It was true - I had missed the lilt of her Darija-Moroccan dialect-so different from the Mesri, the Egyptian twang, that rolled off my tongue.

2- Consider using Arabic semantic structure or phrases and idioms used mostly in Arabic.

Example A: She reddened with embarrassment. // They whitened at the sight of it. ((English would probably say she ‘turned red’ rather than reddened, or ‘paled’ rather than whitened. Since Arabic has this natural and fun ability to let color be a verb, which English can but doesn't have naturally - make use of it! It will read differently in English because it’s an Arabic construct. Use other examples like this that you’d know better than me.))

Example B: Consider using “May the Gods smite her house!,” instead of the classic English ‘Fuck You.’ Or use “On my eyes” rather than ‘min ayooni’ or its English translation of ‘of course.’ Since Arabic language is beautifully expressive, you could lean into that when you can rather than using common English alternatives.

 Example C: Consider interspersing Arabic transliterations of common words/phrases like; habibti/habibi; yani; mashallah casually through the story.  

3- When speaking with English speakers, consider using informal text/chat speak (Arabizi?) to communicate the Arabic, since it’s already transliterated to the Roman alphabet. [disclaimer - I am atrocious at this, and will be surprised if anyone can read it… but for science!]: 

Example A: Instead of (انت طالب بالجامعة) or “are you a student?” it becomes; 

“Ente 6albeh bel jam3a?” I asked, staring at the textbook in his arms. 

He looked at me confused. “I don't understand,” he said. “I can’t speak Arabic.” 

“Wain 3m tedrus? Where do you… y3ni… where do you study?” I tried again in slow, awkward English.

These examples may or may not work for you. It’s important to remember that there’s no single "right" way to do this, but it’s mostly about finding a balance that reads well, and feels good to you. Subtle cues like sentence structure, idioms, the occasional untranslated word, and natural context can help to show the language shift. Good luck and happy writing!

~ Melanie 🌻