The Parlor Renders on YouTube

A short little video of Mayfair Witches house renderings...

Former YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki Has Passed Away

Lasher Appears

Replacing an earlier video with some of my own family in it with this Mayfair Witches-related video to keep content Mayfair Witches-related, this is the first upload with the new AI feature requirement.

Afternoon In the Haunted Garden of the Mayfair Witches

The Parlor's Dammit Doll

A Little Mayfair Witches Ambience ASMR-style

The Parlor is trying something new.  It might have been mentioned before, but this new experiment is...ambience.  ASMR-style.

The Parlor Extends Deepest Sympathies to former YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki and Her Family

 

The Mayfair House--A 3D Update

I thought it was time I provided an update on my project, a 3D model of the Mayfair house on First Street.  There are some details I've added, some obvious, some not so obvious.  This update shows only part of the first floor, and there are certainly details I've not gotten to yet.  One is that there appears to be a door or window on the end of the butler's pantry that faces the pool and patio area of the garden.

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year from the Parlor!

I've been working on 3D graphics like crazy.  Mostly because I kept having issues, which in turn led to at least one software upgrade and a major cleanup of graphics files.  It's unfortunate that at the moment, I have system limitations that prevent me from creating more of the type of graphics I want to create.  That's a wordy way of saying my laptop is an old fa--older device.

Perhaps I will be able to obtain a more powerful machine that will be able to handle rendering software at some point.  Lumion is one example.  I'm especially anxious to be able to do more because I would love to be able to do even more with 3D models like what is in this animation:

This animation also appears on the Parlor's home page.

In it, you see a 3D model of a woman, a Mayfair Witch.  The image created using AI technology of Charlotte Mayfair provided the textures for the face on the 3D model.  It's not perfect, but it's not exactly finished, either.

The emerald key from the AMC series that she is wearing is a 3D model of it that I also made.  You know, I had to actually draw the symbols freestyle in the 3D software, and it was sooo tedious!  I tried to keep the model as close to the one in the series as possible, and I will improve it as I am able to reproduce other details of the key.  

When I make graphics for the Parlor that include the key, more and more, you will see my 3D model of the key in it.  I have another version with slightly different metal textures that might still be seen here and there.  

I think now that I have made as much progress on the model of the Mayfair house as I have, it is time to begin introducing the characters themselves, including Lasher.  His first appearance is the image of Lasher created by Jennifer Harris for MAYFAIR, and his entry has been made via Tante Oscar's phone, which has been moved from Tante Oscar's fridge to the Mayfair fridge.

What a coincidence--that is the spot in the Mayfair house where Lasher first revealed himself to Rowan.  Lasher had shown himself to Rowan the moment her mother, Deirdre, died and again on the flight from San Francisco to New Orleans for Deirdre's funeral.  But the first time Lasher showed himself to Rowan in the Mayfair house was at pretty much the same spot where we see Lasher pop up from Tante Oscar's iPhone...

This is also one of the rare occasions where you will hear notty werds in the Parlor.  For those of you who don't mind the occasional f-bomb, have a look:

Again...Happy New Year, everyone!

A (Belated) Mayfair Christmas Dinner In 3D

If you read the description of the video, you will see that this particular video is now the single most difficult I have ever made.  Not because Christmas dinners make me cry (they don't), but because of numerous problems with software, which still gave me grief even AFTER I upgraded it. 

Now, I understand that now that it's upgraded, there are some more things it is now capable of doing.  Well, that's good, because the next thing I'm gonna work on is my Dammit Doll, and I'm gonna animate it and it's gonna look great being banged on something somewhere in the 3D house--

Anyway.

Before sitting down at the table, please give your cellphones to Tante Oscar, and she'll put 'em in the fridge for ya.  Bring it to the table, and someone gave that kid over there a remote control F14 fighter with little bitty projectiles and all and it's got this remote control so I'm borrowing it in case--

Oops!  

I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas, and wishing you all a happy New Year!

A Wee Bit of a 3D Mayfair Witches House Update Teaser

The Parlor has been pretty busy with a lot of things, but aren't we all at this time of year?  Not all of it has been good, though, so having something to escape with means my 3D model project of the Mayfair house--1239 First Street in New Orleans--has come a long way.

This is a tiny little teaser, but also to get you thinking about the character of Lasher.  What are his true intentions for the Mayfair Witches?  Why is Christmas so central to Lasher's history and his plans?  And how is that going to play out in Season 2 of AMC's Mayfair Witches when there wasn't any mention of Christmas to any real extent in Season 1?

Michael Curry's love of Christmas really stands out in The Witching Hour.  His memories of Christmas as a child, and his later love of the holiday led to his collecting an assortment of beautiful Christmas ornaments.  When he went back to San Francisco briefly to close up his house and business and ship some of his belongings to New Orleans, among those belongings were some boxes of the Christmas ornaments he'd collected.  He was thrilled to finally be able to have a Christmas tree large enough to display all of these treasures.

This is partly what inspired me to include a version of the Mayfair house that is a Christmas version.  Like the model of the house itself, the Christmas version is by no means finished, but I'm tucking in a few little surprises here and there.

Something else, as long as I'm on the subject of San Francisco: Rowan and Michael relocated just in time in The Witching Hour.  The novel's present-day time is 1989, and San Francisco had the major earthquake in October of that year.  Looking at photos of the area where Michael's house was set in, if he were an actual person, he'd be bleepin' lucky his house managed to escape with what sounds like comparatively minor damage.  Like the roof leak.

At some point, I want to resume exploring Michael's love of Victoriana.  Some things I'm trying to update at the time of year those things are relevant.  In the meantime, I've been looking at other things that could stand to be updated and added on to.  Even things as seemingly insignificant as bits of tradition and cultural heritage unique to New Orleans, seen in creative ways.

But I'm getting ahead of myself, here.  This is a very brief teaser as we get closer to Christmas...

Progress on the Parlor 3D Model of 1239 First Street For Christmas!

Have a look...

The Mayfair Witches Dining Room

As Thanksgiving is near, I thought I would put together an update on the 3D model of the Mayfair house at 1239 First Street focusing on the dining room.  The actual dining room has a panoramic mural that continues along the walls, and in the Lives of the Mayfair Witches, this mural is described as being that of Riverbend Plantation.  This plantation is where the Mayfair Witches settled upon their arrival in Louisiana after having fled Saint-Domingue on the eve of the Haitian Revolution.

Replicating such a mural turned out to be just about impossible, so instead, I found a panorama of a Louisiana bayou.  For some reason, this just made the room "feel" more like the Mayfair Witches' dining room.  In the dining hutch, which is from the 3D model of the Addams house by Demilune, instead of a mirror, I found a rendering of Belle Grove Plantation, which was located in Iberville Parish, Louisiana.  

This is not the dining room of the AMC series, but I did manage to tuck in some of the pomegranate patterned wallpaper in the butlers' pantry, which you get a brief glimpse of.  However, I did put up some framed Mayfair Witches' portraits in this dining room.

The place settings, the dishes and the displays are inspired by Rowan and Michael's exploration of the Mayfair house the day after Deirdre Mayfair's funeral.  I've always loved that tour they took.  Then, there are the candles...

Mayfairs In 3D

Some of the 3D creations by the Parlor are now available for download on 3D Warehouse!  There will be more to come, but so far, I've added my model of the Mayfair Emerald, the jewelry made with the cameos from the cover of the 1st edition of Blackwood Farm, and a little book mentioned in Lasher: Legends of the Highlands.  It doesn't open, but I went for a nice, old leatherbound book feel.

I've also added a few paintings in frames, two of which are of the paintings by Albrecht Durer and Rembrandt.  The portrait used for the 1st edition cover of Blood Canticle is also in a frame for a 3D art gallery.

If you saw my Tomb of the Mayfair Witches video, you might have seen a little something special in it.  That one will make its way to 3D Warehouse as well once I put together a summary of its creation.

I am very busy working on individual rooms in the 3D model of 1239 First Street.  At the moment, I'm working on the dining room, a very interesting room indeed.  Then I had a thought: since the holidays are upon us, what if I set up each room to be seen at completion on particular holidays?  Perfect timing; it's almost Thanksgiving here in America and I'm already working on the dining room! 

All of this is a work in progress, so please do keep checking back for more graphics and more about their significance in the Lives of the Mayfair Witches... 

3D Model Goes Inside First Street

 

I am all kinds of excited!  I've finally gotten to a point in the project where I can provide a major update on its progress!  Much more detail has been added to the 3D model of 1239 First Street.

Now, this model is by no means finished.  I have focused a lot on structural details, like the crown mouldings, baseboards, porches, etc.  It's tough to get plain old paint to look right in a house like this, and I cannot imagine how I am going to somehow get the dining room walls to feature the murals (or any murals) the actual house has.  

Not only is the scale of the house quite massive, but the staircase is a lot more narrow and steep than what you would find in houses built in our lifetimes.  The cornices have also been quite a challenge and those are definitely not done yet!

You will see wallpaper in the rooms shown.  You might even recognize some of the wallpaper used.  One Mayfair Witches fan managed to find samples of the wallpaper used for the interior of the Mayfair house in the AMC series.  The dining room is one of those rooms.  If I can't figure out how to get a mural onto the walls in that room, I'll use the wallpaper sample that most closely shows the colors of the mural.  I'll also put the portraits of the Mayfair Witches on the dining room walls as well.  Some are already there.

They might not have the same frames in the finished version that they do now, but I'll cross that bridge when I get to it.

One other thing from the AMC series is one of the photographs Rowan finds in Ciprien's cellphone.  On closer inspection, it is clearly of one of Stella's Roaring Twenties parties.  Photos like this were also mentioned in The Witching Hour, so I've included it here as well. 

In this update, I focused a lot on displaying smaller 3D models inspired by the novels and/or items from the novels.  You will also see one of the maps from The Witches' Companion by Katherine Ramsland displayed in the model.  

I love a good Easter egg, and this 3D model will be no different.  Very, very briefly (for now) are glimpses of a portrait of a woman in the double parlor.  This portrait is from the real life history of 1239 First Street, a portrait of Pamela Starr Clapp.  Her husband, Emory Clapp, bought the house for her as a wedding gift from Elizabeth Brevard, the daughter of the original owner, Albert Hamilton Brevard.  If I recall, Pamela Starr Clapp, who lived in the house from 1869 to her death in 1934, loved her home.  And...she is rumored to haunt the house, probably to this day.

So, I wanted to include a portrait of her in the model as well.  

Are there pictures of Anne Rice in the model?

Does a bear sh--yes, there is one, so far.  The one on the wall is one of my favorites of her.  I do want to include more, though.  Because all of this came from her, and I want the model to ultimately showcase and celebrate what she created.

In The Witching Hour, Rowan Mayfair set about having a "state of the art" phone system installed due to the house being so big.  Phones are phones, but should I reach a point where I do add the kitchen, there is one contribution that must be made.  

The phone in the kitchen will be found in the refrigerator. 

To view the short video, you may go to Come Into My Parlor In 3D or you may view it on the Parlor's YouTube channel...

The Parlor Has Some Goodies and an IWtV Season 2 Update...

The Parlor has been hard at work with building the 3D model of 1239 First Street!  Not only is it to help bring the world of the Mayfair Witches "to life", so to speak, the hobby itself can be calming when world events are in a state of total horror and chaos.  Very soon, I intend to make some brief videos of the model to show the details, but I'll give a few brief teasers here...

The painting is the one used on the first edition cover of Blood Canticle

The first edition of The Witching Hour had a drawing of 1239 First Street on the title page

A model of the coffee cup from Knives Out (2019).  I should make a New Orleans themed version...

For Interview With the Vampire fans, here is a video clip from AMC+'s YouTube channel:

1239 First Street In 3D

After sorting through my project files, I've been able to make some progress building a 3D model of 1239 First Street.  This is a challenging project for several reasons, most of which have to do with structural details.  For someone like me who is a native of the Pacific Northwest, I'm pretty used to houses with much lower ceilings (vaulted ceilings are popular here, though).  So, the first challenge is the scale of a house like this.

There are three different types of columns on the front gallery of the Brevard-Rice house, but only one of the three types, Doric, is not fluted.  The Ionic and Corinthian fluted columns and capitals are definitely a recognizable feature of this house.  Then, there is the iron lace that is iconic in New Orleans architecture.

It took a bit of time, but I was able to find pieces that were used to create the iron arches and balcony rails.  When I resumed the project, that was actually where I started.  They are a detail of the house that cannot be substituted with anything else.  Beginning with features like this tends to help me go from visualizing to creating as I make progress.  

Even the roof is something of a challenge!  A peaked roof with parapets that have cornices on them...that are right over the front gallery.  As I was going over the house's details, I realized that what would ordinarly be chimneys seems to be something else.  I can only imagine it has something to do with a detail mentioned in The Witching Hour--fireplaces fitted for gas?

The front door is actually recessed a couple of feet from the Egyptian keyhole frame.  I went back in and redid this part in the 3D model of the doorway that I'd already made.  The model still has a long way to go, but I am making video updates and embedding them--one at a time--on the page of the Parlor, Come Into My Parlor In 3D.

The project updates are at the top of the page on the Parlor.

Oh, and I've made a new key for the front door.

Mary Beth Mayfair

I've made a new version of the animated portrait of Mary Beth Mayfair.  It has the floating rose petals and a music clip from the countdown clips for the AMC series.  There is something subtle but different from the first version I made of Mary Beth Mayfair.  Can you guess what it is?

Stella Mayfair "Sings"-Techno Flapper

I was animating Stella Mayfair on cutout.pro, and got curious to see what Stella looked like up close and animated...

...and THIS happened:

Mayfair Funny Pages

For giggles, I decided to redo a brief little short video I made when the Parlor began massive renovations.  I added a little sound, as well.  I also wanted a better image of the Egyptian Keyhole doorway with the signs and sleeping cat on a doormat that says--well, look here:

The Mayfair House--First Street

There has been a lot of interest in the Mayfair house since the premiere of the AMC series.  So, I've added a few things to Inside First Street and House of Patterns.

 

The video above has been on Inside First Street for many years.  It is still there, but now, instead of this video by itself, you will see a YouTube playlist in its place, with the video as the thumbnail.  There are about 5 videos in the playlist so far, including this one.  

Near the bottom of House of Patterns is another embedded video.  The video by StudioSims Create, which is also on YouTube, is in French.  It is a Sims model of the Mayfair house, and it includes the garden and pool!  I put it on this particular page because it might be fun to compare the model with the plans of the Mayfair house!

I began a 3D model of the Mayfair house using SketchUp Pro a couple years ago.  You can see a section of the Parlor model in the memorial video, but I might put some clips from it together so you can see the model on its own.  Hopefully, I'll get that done soon.  

Eventually, I'd like to put together some information on the Mayfair house of the AMC series, the Soria-Creel house.  It would be more of an historical survey and discussion of the structural elements of the house.  It would also be a comparison to the house at 1239 First Street so fans of the books and/or the AMC series will be able to distinguish the two houses from one another...