Hola mis amigos!

Happy New Year everyone! So here we are starting a new year, and just like every other month it is time to recap all that happened around our estate in the past month.

Partnership with The BOSL.
 

As you may know by now, we partnered with The BOSL. Frolic Mills, CEO & founder has been one of my oldest friends here in SL™. The BOSL is without a doubt the bible about fashion & living in SL™ and it is the most succesful in-world magazine.  This partnership will help our community keep up to date with the latest trends around SL™, and it will also help promote the estate outside its borders. The BOSL link is located under Fashion, Music & More. Click here to read the press release.

New Members Of The Executive Team

Two more residents joined the Executive Team last month. Millie Gears and Jimi Xi are now in charge of the Resident Concierge department. Their job is to make sure that all our residents are looked after and have everything they need to enjoy their experience here in the Costa Rica Sims to the fullest.
 

Millie and Jimi also offer fantastic guided tours around the amenities our estate offers. Don't be shy and send them an IM to schedule a tour.

Land Sales

We closed the year with the estate at 99.3% occupancy.This is an amazing acomplishment when you take in consideration the huge number of estates that went down this past year. During 2009, we reached 300 residents, from 49 different coutries around the world, the estate doubled its size, now 4,128,768 sqm, and we surpassed the goal set at the beginning of the year of reaching 60 sims by the end of 2009.

Amenities

Closing Club E-co

I have always said many times that I never explored owning a club here in SL™ because of the large amounts of time you need to dedicate to it, with not many positive returns for your investment, and the drama that haunts clubs, which creates lots of stress. After many unsuccessful attempts to find responsible individuals that were willing to manage the club in a professional way, and not just collect their weekly salaries without any remorse of not delivering what they were hired for, I suggested to Geko Stoop, owner of E-co, that it was not worth keeping the club open due to the stress it was creating and lack of quality management. E-co may have not been the most succesful club in SL™, but one can say it was the most beautiful.

Events

Costa Rica Designers Showcase December: The Best Of 2009

Without a doubt, the best show of the year. Amazing creations by the fabulous designers at our Commercial District. I have to say that my favorite one was the creation by Raven Pennyfeather of The House of RFyre. The Oksana Russian Christmas Holiday Dress was simply amazing.

I would like to thank all designers for their wonderful creations and also big kudos to our fabulous Costa Rica Sims Productions Team, Clyde Saunders, Director and all our models for all the hard work during 2009. If you missed this fabulous show you can read Takeshi's review here.

Costa Rica Sims Executive Team Second Annual Winter Ball
 

This is my favorite event of the year. The reason? Well we pay tribute to our residents for making the Costa Rica Sims the most beautiful estate in all Second Life®. It was great to see some many familiar faces dressed to the nines enjoying the amazing voice of Miss Coda Cazalet.

We are trying to convince Miss Cazalet to have a weekly performance here at the Costa Rica Ladies' Society Botanical Gardens , so if you liked her style, make sure to send her an IM telling her how much you would enjoy having her perform at our estate every week.
 

Our estate blogger Takeshi Kiama has a magnificent review of the ball that you can read by clicking here and we also have many photos in our flickr.

Miss Virtual World

What an amazing and looooong show that was. It ran for almost 7 hours, but just like previous years it was totally worth it. Congratulations to Miss Costa Rica Sims,  Nisa Constantine for reaching the 10 finalists. As mentioned before other two residents were also part of the pageant and both did a tremendous job. Kudos to Miss Ireland, Dancer Dallagio for reaching the 10 finalists and Miss Bahamas, Devine Hunt for reaching the Top 5 finalist.

                             

There is no doubt that our estate is home to the most beautiful and talented Second Life® residents!

Rezz Days Party

What better way to close 2009 than with our monthly rezz days party. WK Ganesvoort, long time resident and winner of the "Most Beautiful Parcel" contest this year, an event part of our 2nd aniversary celebration, was kind enough to open the doors to his magnificent estate for our last event of the year. WK is the proud owner of the largest private residence in our estate, it covers almost 2 sims and some guest at the party said they felt like if they were visiting Buckingham Palace. If you havent visited this magnificent estate make sure to send WK an IM and he will be more than happy to show you around.

Like every month our very own DJ/Hearthrob Azu Catteneo kept the crowd going wild with his hot tunes. Many thanks to WK for having us and many happy rezz days to him and to Alexzel3D, Anika, Carmichael, Due, Ensane, Georgianna, Katherine, Karima, Kikko, Luke, Mavericus, Rawly & TiRoNKo.

Without a doubt a party to remember. I was not able to stay until the end but I heard party turned crazy and wild at the end! Want to read all about it? Let Takeshi give you the inside scoop by clicking here.

Upcoming Events

We will add more events in 2010 and we will continue with the ones we have now:  theme parties, learning classes, fashion shows, regattas, treasure hunts, beauty pageants, etc...

Building classes 2010
 
Jimi will start with our building classes this week. For those of you who know Jimi, be prepared to have lots of laughs while learning cause without a doubt he is cookoo!  If you want to register send him and IM and if you want to learn more about the course click here to read the schedule.

 Costa Rica Desingers Showcase January

Our first Designers Showcase of 2010 will feature the amazing designs of Mami Jewell owner and designer of AZUL. So make sure to mark your calendars cause this is a show you don't want to miss.

Merchant News
 

And talking about Azul, we are more than happy to welcome Mami Jewell to our commercial disctrict. It is almost impossible for fashionable ladies not to know about the Azul brand but for those who have been living in total darkness, head straight into the light and visit her store today just click the logo above to get the slurl.

Updates

Leatherback Turtle Campaign

In the month of December, we raised L$ 8,510. I would like to thank all who kindly donated to this worthy cause: Grega Markstein, Wilkes Lionheart, MenuBar Memorial, Lacosadivina Quintessa, Janjii Rugani, Precious Bonetto, King Horngold, ScarletJolie Denimore, JayBe Fayray & Breydon Lane. Special thanks to Rory Serpente and Carmichael Caudron for their generous donations.

As always, here is a photo of the transaction made via Paypal for last month's donation.

Like every month I would like to welcome the new residents that moved to our estate in the past month: Amadeus, Ariel, Botty, Carlotta, Casey, Coca, Cramer, Cristobal, Derek, Dixiesweet28, Dondiego, Fly, Fredy, Gators, Giovani, Giselle, Gothyka, GracieB, Gwen, Hortencio, Issabella, Jericho, Juli, Karma, Maikle, Muzicole, N3N3, Pook, Prisqua, Queen, Quetzal, Rivers, Rory, Seri, Sheila, Sparkling, Tironko, TJ, TomGuy & Wilkes.

So 2009 is officially over. We forsee many good things happening to our estate in 2010. I would like thank all the members of the Executive Team for their hard work and dedication during this past year, our business partners for their wonderful collaborations, the fabulous designers at our commercial disctrict, but above all the residents of the estate who are the real owners of the Costa Rica Sims, thanks for your love and loyalty to the land you call home in Second Life®. May 2010 be everything you hoped for and more!

Love & Light,

Gian