As promised, I’m reporting on last week’s art in progress. I’ve been working on the exterior of the Reulga city hall, and I’m pretty happy with where it’s going, although it’s not anywhere near done yet.
Yeah, turns out, landscape design is hard. Especially when you’re inadvertently worldbuilding along the way.
Take, for example, that huge oak there. I put it in by accident, but once I saw it, I realized it’s a major landmark. The Tree of Tyrbrion, also known as the Freedom Oak, was planted at the end of the Gwelharian revolution to mark the birth of the Republic of Tyrbrion (which later became the core of Halcia). The tree is now 132 years old. Well, probably a little older — it was planted as a sapling, and judging by the diameter it’s closer to 140.
There’s still a lot of work to be done here, in terms of art and worldbuilding both.
The building to the right is the Glass Palace, the biggest and most famous reflectory in the city. Which is to say, it’s a cross between a museum, a library, a concert hall, and a psychotherapy clinic. That will take a lot of figuring out, and the only idea I have so far is that it probably has a dome. It does need a lot of light inside, and it is basically a cathedral minus the religious aspect.
And the building at the back, my map tells me, is called the Halls of Justice. Must be housing the judiciary branch of the Halcian government. I still have no idea what that’s supposed to look like architecturally. I look forward to finding out.
…It may seem like I’m overthinking this, and sometimes I’m tempted to tighten the shots and move on with the story. But I’d already done that with the Shelisk citadel, and I ended up having to remodel it and now need to go back and fix things.
And… this is the Dannorim Isle, the Isle of Green Oaks — the heart of Halcia. A lot of the story to come will be happening in and around these buildings. A lot of history has already happened in and around them. I feel like I need to get this right from the get-go, or at least try to.
And hey, this is just the east half of the island. At least I don’t have to figure out the Reulga Castle yet =)