#General Assembly Drawing

[caddesignexperts]

Top CAD Drafting Services in the USA for Precision Designs

In today’s fast-paced design and construction landscape, precision is essential. A small error in a technical drawing can result in expensive rework, project delays, or compliance issues. That’s why more businesses across the United States are turning to professional CAD Drafting Services transforming concepts into detailed, actionable designs that drive results.

From architectural layouts and mechanical components to electrical schematics and HVAC systems, CAD (Computer-Aided Design) plays a critical role in nearly every technical project. This blog explores the value of CAD drafting, what makes a top-tier service provider, and why Asset-Eyes is a trusted partner for precision CAD drafting services across the USA.

What Are CAD Drafting Services?

CAD drafting services involve the use of computer software to create detailed technical drawings and schematics. These drawings can be in 2D for construction and permit sets, or in 3D for modeling, visualization, and simulation. CAD drafters convert sketches, handwritten notes, or design concepts into structured digital files that guide construction, manufacturing, or engineering processes.

These services are widely used in:

Architecture and construction

Mechanical and HVAC Equipment Design

Electrical and civil engineering

Product and industrial design

Infrastructure development

CAD drawings ensure accuracy, consistency, and compliance with national and industry-specific standards.

Why Precision Drafting Matters

Accurate CAD drafting serves as the foundation for successful projects. Benefits include:

Fewer on-site errors and construction conflicts

Faster approval from building authorities

Accurate cost estimation and material planning

Enhanced communication among project stakeholders

Improved overall project efficiency

Without precision drafting, even the most innovative design ideas may fall short during execution.

What Makes a CAD Drafting Service “Top-Tier”?

1. Technical Expertise

Leading firms employ certified and experienced drafters who understand the specific requirements of architecture, MEP (Mechanical, Electrical, Plumbing), structural systems, and product design.

2. Software Proficiency

Top providers work across platforms like AutoCAD, Revit, SolidWorks, Inventor, SketchUp, and MicroStation to suit client preferences and project demands.

3. Quality Assurance

A strong quality control process ensures accuracy, adherence to standards (such as ASME, ANSI, AIA), and consistent output.

4. BIM and 3D Capabilities

Beyond 2D layouts, top firms deliver 3D models and Building Information Modeling (BIM) services, helping clients visualize systems and detect clashes before construction begins.

5. Quick Turnarounds

Speed without sacrificing quality. Scalable teams and streamlined processes allow top firms to meet tight deadlines.

6. Industry Versatility

The ability to work across sectors from residential construction to high-end industrial design demonstrates flexibility and deep domain knowledge.

Key CAD Drafting Services in Demand

2D CAD Drafting

Floor plans, site plans, elevations, and sections

MEP schematics and layouts

Permit and construction documentation

3D CAD Modeling

Parametric product models

Structural and architectural 3D views

Walk-through visualizations

Architectural Drafting

Interior and exterior detailing

Fire escape plans and code-compliant layouts

As-built drawing updates

Mechanical and HVAC CAD Drafting

Equipment layouts, duct routing, and mechanical room detailing

Piping, valves, and system diagrams

Fabrication and assembly drawings

Electrical Drafting

Power and lighting layouts

Panel schedules and circuiting

Low-voltage system schematics

Why Businesses in the USA Are Outsourcing CAD Drafting

Outsourcing CAD drafting brings several advantages:

Reduced operational costs

Access to specialized talent without full-time hiring

Faster project cycles

Enhanced accuracy through experienced professionals

Ability to handle fluctuating project loads

Outsourcing does not mean compromising on quality. In fact, with the right partner, quality often improves.

Asset-Eyes: Your Trusted CAD Drafting Partner

Asset-Eyes delivers high-precision CAD drafting services tailored to meet the specific needs of clients across the United States. Whether you are an architect, contractor, HVAC engineer, or product manufacturer, we help you convert your vision into buildable, manufacturable, and code-compliant drawings.

Our Core Offerings

2D drafting and 3D modeling

HVAC and MEP design support

Revit and BIM coordination

Structural and architectural detailing

Mechanical and fabrication drawing sets

Paper-to-CAD conversions

What Sets Asset-Eyes Apart

Proficiency in all major CAD platforms including AutoCAD, SolidWorks, Revit, and Inventor

Detailed quality checks before final delivery

On-time submissions with transparent communication

Custom solutions aligned with your project standards and specifications

Competitive pricing for businesses of all sizes

When you choose Asset-Eyes, you're partnering with a team that values accuracy, reliability, and long-term relationships.

Case Studies: Our Impact in Action

Commercial HVAC Layout for East Coast Office Tower

Asset-Eyes created complete 2D and 3D HVAC layout drawings for a 14-story office building, coordinating with plumbing and electrical systems to avoid clashes. Our fast turnaround enabled the contractor to meet permit deadlines without delay.

SolidWorks Modeling for Manufacturing Client

A Midwest-based industrial equipment firm needed over 200 fabrication-ready part drawings within two weeks. Our team used SolidWorks to deliver fully toleranced, assembly-linked files that moved straight to production.

Choosing the Right CAD Partner

Not all drafting providers offer the same level of service. When selecting a CAD partner, consider:

Experience in your specific industry

Use of appropriate software tools

Quality control processes

Speed and reliability

Support for revisions and long-term collaboration

Asset-Eyes meets all of these criteria, making us a reliable drafting extension of your in-house team.

How to Start Working with Asset-Eyes

We make it easy to begin:

Send Us Your Requirements Share sketches, markups, or design goals.

Get a Fast, Transparent Quote We review the scope and provide a competitive estimate.

Project Kickoff and Drafting Begins You get updates and previews throughout the process.

Final Delivery and Revisions Receive your CAD files in DWG, DXF, PDF, or other formats.

Ongoing Support Whether you need future edits, new drawings, or full documentation sets, we’re here to help.

Final Thoughts

As projects grow in complexity, the demand for high-precision CAD drafting continues to rise. Companies across the United States are turning to professional drafting firms not just for drawings, but for dependable support, quality assurance, and speed.

Asset-Eyes is proud to deliver CAD drafting services that meet these needs with accuracy, efficiency, and a commitment to your success.

If you're looking for a trusted CAD partner to support your next design or construction project, connect with Asset-Eyes today. Let’s bring clarity and precision to your work, one CAD Drawing Services at a time.

[asseteyes]

Unlock the Power of Precision with Professional CAD Drafting Services

In today’s fast-paced engineering and manufacturing industries, CAD drafting services play a critical role in turning innovative ideas into real-world solutions. From detailed component designs to full-scale assembly layouts, businesses rely on expert CAD services to streamline development, reduce errors, and accelerate time to market.

SolidWorks Design: Building with Precision

SolidWorks remains one of the most trusted tools in 3D modeling and simulation. Professional SolidWorks design services enable businesses to visualize, test, and optimize products before production begins. Whether you're designing custom machinery, consumer electronics, or industrial equipment, leveraging SolidWorks ensures high precision and design integrity.

General Assembly Drawing: Seeing the Big Picture

A general assembly drawing provides a comprehensive overview of how parts fit together in a system. These drawings are essential for engineers, fabricators, and maintenance teams, helping to ensure accurate assembly, identify interferences, and streamline documentation.

Comprehensive CAD Drawing Services

Beyond 3D models and assemblies, robust CAD drawing services include 2D schematics, fabrication drawings, and BOM (Bill of Materials) creation. Whether for prototyping or full-scale production, these drawings serve as the blueprint for quality manufacturing.

Electrical Control Panel Design

When it comes to automation and industrial systems, electrical control panel design is crucial. Precise CAD layouts help ensure the correct placement of components, optimal wire routing, and adherence to safety standards. With CAD-based design, troubleshooting and upgrades become faster and more efficient.

Machine Design Company: Engineering Innovation

A top-tier machine design company brings together mechanical, electrical, and automation expertise to deliver fully integrated solutions. From concept to commissioning, having a partner that provides end-to-end CAD support enhances innovation while minimizing design risks.

HVAC Equipment Design: Ensuring Comfort and Efficiency

In the HVAC equipment design must balance performance, efficiency, and space constraints. CAD drafting enables engineers to create modular, scalable systems that meet the complex demands of commercial and industrial environments. Custom ductwork, control systems, and equipment housing can all be designed with unmatched accuracy.

Conclusion

Choosing the right partner for CAD drafting services is essential to bringing your project to life. Whether you're developing a new product, upgrading electrical systems, or designing HVAC equipment, expert CAD services ensure every detail is covered — from the first sketch to the final build.

Looking for reliable CAD support? Partner with a machine design company that understands your vision and delivers with precision.

[camellcat]

we spent our darkest days howling at the moon close enough to see our low condition and did you wish that we were one?

close-ups! I'm not very good at cohesion if you couldn't tell, so here's how they're supposed to look

[redbean-nom]

tactical droid vs clone culture

I was thinking about how General Kalani is one of the only droids with an actual (non-serial number-related) name, and I looked up the super tactical droid wookiepedia page:

and huh! of the four known ST droids, three of them have obviously individual names, and given that their serials would be ST-something, Aut-0 is probably a name too!

(Aut-0's name also seems to demonstrate that he has some sort of sense of humor, and Kraken's paint is suspiciously kraken-looking.)

a bit of further delving found pictures for Kalani, Kraken, and Aut-0 (Linwodo doesn't seem to appear in any visual media).

not only do they all have individual names, they also seem to have unique paint!

now, basic tactical droids do have some distinguishing symbols, but these tend to be simple central lines or logos - just enough to be distinguished.

since ST droids are pretty easily distinguishable from tactical droids (and there'd only really be one on the battlefield anyways), and none of their units have anything similar design-wise, we can conclude that the ST droids' paint is an individual choice.

I doubt Dooku would be busy painting and naming his tactical droids either, so they most likely named and painted each other and themselves...

...much like a certain other batch of beings-not-formally-recognized-as-sentient.

[travels-with-independent-music]

Your Dystopia, My Utopia

[mechaseraph]

Me and my emotional support almost 70MB (and keeps on growing) Gavv refs file that looks like this

....have they posted design works of Caking and Bushel in clear anywhere else also. And Valen Donut I kinda need em for this now orz

[3d-labs-blog]

break tank

pump system layout pump system drawing water supply drawing potable water tank drawing fire suppression system drawing isolation tank drawing overflow protection https://3d-labs.com/product/break-tank/ A break tank is an intermediate tank in a water system, used to prevent backflow, maintain pressure, and ensure a reliable water supply for downstream processes.

[corkinavoid]

DPxDC Trials and Tribulations of Summoning

You know how in most Summoning Danny pieces, it's either some unnamed cult or John Constantine doing the actual circle drawing and chanting and stuff? And while, yes, it makes sense, consider this: Constantine doesn't know shit about summoning ghosts/entities from Infinite Realms. He is more than knowledgeable in summoning demons and biblical horrors and gods and whatnot, but the Realms are an entirely different field of tricky fuckery, and require a completely different skillset and knowledge of different runes and stuff.

Think about it like being a dentist and then getting asked to perform neurosurgery. Like, yes, sure, you're a doctor, and both areas are generally head-related, but it's not your specialty, you don't know anything about it aside from the most general stuff.

So, when the JL needs to summon the Ghost King for whatever reason, and they ask John Constantine, he doesn't start drawing runes on the floor. Instead, he calls a friend.

An hour later, the whole Justice League is graced by the presence of a very young, very obviously goth girl with a sharp tongue, who makes it a point to express how not pleased she is to meet them.

Samantha Manson is rather unimpressed by both the hero assembly in front of her and the alleged world-ending threat she is shown. She doesn't call for Ghost King or anything like that, even, she just clicks her tongue, asks for a pinch of sea salt, a bouquet of any flowers they can find, a mirror, and a few other nonsensical items of choice.

The threat is eliminated within minutes with a bunch of weird magic that no one, not even the members of the JLD, understands.

"You don't need the King for this shit," Samantha Manson says, brushing her hands off, "It'd be like fighting a single cockroach with a nuclear explosion. Don't call me again."

They do call her again, of course. Several times over the years of fighting off all the things that come for Earth.

Until on one memorable occasion, she does summon the Ghost King, and the teen angst bullshit goes from bad to worse in a matter of seconds. Apparently, the King is of the same age as Samantha, and boy, do they have beef with each other.

At least the world does get saved in the process, so there's that.

[yandere-daydreams]

Title: Mesmerized.

Pairing: Yandere!Lyney x Reader (Genshin).

Word Count: 0.8k.

TW: Hypnosis, Unhealthy Relationships, General Lose of Autonomy, Implied Kidnapping, Implied Stalking, and Obsessive Behavior.

[Commissioned piece. Donate to Palestinians in Gaza here.]

“You’re getting crueler, brother.”

Lynette watched you stir at the sound of her voice, nearly identical to that of your dearly beloved, but you slackened as soon as you realized it was only his sister, melting back into place against Lyney’s side. Your expression was one of vacant bliss; all glassy eyes and careless smiles, worry only visible in the dark circles laced under your eyes, the pained creases folded into either corner of your mouth. A poor imitation, altogether. You looked more like yourself when you were angry.

Lyney hummed, resting his head on your shoulder. As if trained to, you cooed softly and raised a hand, carding your fingers through his hair as he spoke, self-satisfaction heavy in his voice. “I’m sure I don’t know what you mean. Is it cruel to want to spend time with one’s dearly cherished?”

“Father said not to let the public see them until—”

“—until we’ve fallen in love,” Lyney finished. It was a clipped summary, to say the least. In reality, Lord Arlecchino’s order had played more closely to the tune of ‘until you’ve collared your pet properly’, but admittedly, Lynette might’ve missed something. She and Freminet had been listening from the other side of a steel door, and Lyney hadn’t been eager to discuss their conversation after her lecture ended. “And I’m sure, if you bothered to ask, you’d already know that we’re quite in love. Aren’t we, beautiful?”

“Quite in love,” you parroted. There was something strange about your inflection, as if you were trying to speak in a language you hadn’t yet mastered, but Lynette chose not to dwell on it.

“And I’d hardly call this the public,” Lyney went on, when Lynette made it clear that she had yet to be impressed. He made a quick, sweeping gesture to the rest of the backstage area – as if the technicians and stage-hands rushing between lighting rigs and half-assembled props were no more real than the silhouetted figures painted onto the set dressing they were hauling into place. “Think of it as… a trial run, to see how much we’ve improved. If everything goes well tonight, perhaps we’ll be able to attend Father’s next banquet together, too. I’ve been dying to introduce them to the rest of our family – preferably without all the screaming and biting, this time.”

That, Lynette could admit, would probably be for the best. She still had a bruise in the shape of your teeth on her left wrist from the day she’d met you, but Lyney still claimed it’d been one of your better first impressions.

“I’ve always wanted to see one of your shows.” You were cupping Lyney’s face, now, using your thumb to draw tender circles into his cheek. “I’ve always loved the opera. You’re playing the male lead, right?”

Lynette pursed her lips, her eyes widening slightly as she turned her attention pointedly towards her brother. He looked away. “I’m still working out the kinks. By this time next week, it should all be right as rain.”

Reluctantly, Lynette let her attention shift back to you. Your sleeves were long, dense with lace and tulle, but a patch of reddened, raw skin where the shackle had been wrapped around your wrist was just barely visible underneath the frivolous material. There was a slight tremble in your stiff shoulders, and when she looked closely, she could see that you were swaying; your legs weak from disuse, barely able to hold your own weight. Her brother, on the other hand – she could remember the last time she’d seen him smiling so widely. He been in a state of pure, untethered euphoria since the moment you were dragged, kicking and swearing, into one of the Fatui’s lesser-used underground holding facilities, and she rarely saw him without a glint in his eye and a light flush painted over her cheeks. It was almost upsetting, to see a face so much like her own so distorted. If she hadn’t been so used to his sudden flurries of passion, she might’ve been disturbed.

“It can’t last.” Lyney straightened, but she didn’t give him a chance to cut in. “The—the trance, I mean. You’re a magician, not a hypnotist. It’s going to wear off, eventually.”

“I’ve always hated stage magic,” you muttered, dreamily. “I know I shouldn’t, but I can’t help it. I hate feeling like I’m the only person who doesn’t know what’s going on.”

“It doesn’t need to last forever, just long enough.” This time, it was Lyney who caught your chin in his hand, pulling you just close enough for a quick, shallow kiss. Lynette looked away before she could be forced to endure yet another unabashed show of affection, but she could still hear him far too clearly when he spoke seconds later, his voice now nearly distant as your own.

“Until we both manage to forget how we could ever live apart.”

[caddesignexperts]

Top Benefits of Using CAD Drawing Services for Your Projects

In today’s fast-paced and precision-driven industries, relying on traditional drafting methods can slow down your workflow and expose your project to costly errors. That’s why CAD (Computer-Aided Design) drawing services have become an essential tool for businesses and professionals in engineering, architecture, manufacturing, and construction.

From accelerating design timelines to ensuring top-notch accuracy, CAD Drawing Services offer a wide range of benefits that contribute directly to the quality and success of your projects.

In this blog post, we’ll explore the top benefits of using CAD drawing services, how they transform project outcomes, and why integrating them into your workflow can provide a lasting competitive advantage.

1. Unmatched Precision and Accuracy

One of the most significant advantages of CAD drawing services is the high level of precision they offer. Manual drafting is susceptible to human errors such as miscalculations or inconsistent scaling. CAD tools eliminate these problems by allowing:

Exact measurements with sub-millimeter accuracy

Clear dimensioning and annotation

Error detection in real time

For industries like structural engineering or mechanical design, where even a slight mistake can result in massive rework or structural failure, CAD ensures reliable outcomes every time.

2. Faster Turnaround Times

Speed is critical in project execution. CAD drawing services can drastically reduce the time it takes to produce detailed technical drawings. Thanks to features like:

Templates and reusable components

Automated drawing tools

Quick revisions and version control

Design teams can complete and deliver drafts much faster than with manual methods. This not only improves internal efficiency but also helps meet tight client deadlines.

3. Easy Revisions and Modifications

Projects evolve — whether it’s client feedback, regulatory changes, or internal design improvements. With traditional drafting, every change might mean redrawing a large section. With CAD drawing services, you can:

Update specific components without affecting the entire design

Maintain a history of revisions

Reduce turnaround time for changes

This flexibility keeps your workflow agile and responsive to evolving project requirements.

4. Enhanced Visualization and 3D Modeling

2D drawings are useful, but 3D CAD models take design clarity to a whole new level. With CAD services, you can:

Visualize the final product in three dimensions

Rotate and view components from multiple angles

Create photorealistic renderings for client presentations

This clarity helps stakeholders understand the design better and ensures everyone is aligned before production or construction begins.

5. Improved Collaboration Across Teams

Modern CAD platforms allow multiple team members to work on the same project simultaneously, whether they’re across the office or around the globe. With cloud-based and real-time collaborative tools, CAD services enable:

Live feedback and markup sharing

Centralized file management

Streamlined communication between engineers, designers, and contractors

As a result, teams can collaborate more efficiently and avoid miscommunication that could delay the project.

6. Cost Efficiency and Waste Reduction

By reducing errors, streamlining processes, and shortening timelines, CAD drawing services contribute significantly to cost savings. Here's how:

Fewer physical prototypes are needed thanks to virtual testing

Less material waste due to accurate measurements

Reduced labor hours on revisions and corrections

Smarter planning with CAD often translates to smarter budgeting.

7. Standardized and Compliant Designs

CAD drawings can be generated to meet specific industry and regional standards. This ensures:

Compliance with building codes and regulations

Easy submission for permit approvals

Fewer issues during inspections

Most CAD software includes libraries of standardized components and formats, which help maintain quality and consistency across all drawings.

8. Integration with Other Tools and Technologies

CAD doesn’t operate in isolation. It integrates seamlessly with other systems like:

BIM (Building Information Modeling) for construction projects

CAE (Computer-Aided Engineering) for stress analysis and simulation

CAM (Computer-Aided Manufacturing) for production processes

This interoperability enables a full digital workflow—from concept to completion without needing to convert or redraw designs.

9. Scalability for Large Projects

For large-scale projects that require dozens or even hundreds of detailed drawings, CAD Drafting Services are scalable and can manage:

Complex architectural layouts

Multi-discipline engineering designs

Detailed part libraries for mass production

With layered drawings, referencing systems, and easy duplication features, managing big projects becomes more organized and efficient.

10. Data Storage and Archiving

CAD files are easy to store, retrieve, and update, unlike physical drawings that degrade or get misplaced over time. Benefits include:

Digital backups for disaster recovery

Version control to track progress

Easy access for audits and future renovations

Having a well-organized digital archive ensures long-term asset value and reference for future projects.

11. Customizability and Flexibility

Every project is unique, and CAD services are adaptable to:

Various industries (architecture, mechanical, civil, electrical, etc.)

Different drawing standards (ISO, ANSI, DIN, etc.)

Specific client or regulatory requirements

Whether you need construction blueprints, MEP layouts, or electrical schematics, CAD drawing services can be customized to fit your exact needs.

12. Professional Output and Presentation

In client-facing industries, presentation matters. CAD services help you deliver:

Professionally labeled and dimensioned drawings

Clean and scalable output formats (PDF, DWG, DXF)

Renderings and walkthroughs for presentations

This level of quality enhances your brand reputation and builds trust with clients and stakeholders.

Real-Life Use Cases Across Industries

Construction & Architecture

CAD drawing services support everything from floor plans and elevations to plumbing layouts and structural frameworks, helping contractors visualize every phase before ground is broken.

Mechanical & Industrial Design

Manufacturers use CAD for machine part designs, assemblies, and prototypes, often integrating it with CAM for direct production.

Electrical & Electronics

Engineers use CAD for PCB layouts, wiring diagrams, and control systems, ensuring clarity in both design and troubleshooting.

Urban Planning & Infrastructure

CAD helps city planners design roads, drainage systems, and zoning layouts, contributing to smarter and more sustainable development.

Outsourcing CAD Drawing Services – A Smart Business Move

While some companies choose to build in-house CAD teams, many prefer outsourcing to expert service providers. The benefits of outsourcing include:

Reduced overhead and HR costs

Access to specialized CAD talent

Scalability during peak demand

Focus on core business functions

A reliable CAD service partner like Asset Eyes ensures that your drawings are delivered with technical accuracy, industry compliance, and visual clarity—all while saving you time and money.

Partner with Asset Eyes for Expert CAD Drawing Services

Looking for dependable and professional CAD drafting solutions? Asset Eyes offers a full range of CAD services tailored to meet the unique needs of your industry.

Whether you need:

2D floor plans

3D mechanical models

Structural detailing

Electrical and MEP schematics

…our team is ready to deliver precise, high-quality drawings that keep your projects on track.

With a deep commitment to quality, timelines, and confidentiality, Asset Eyes is your trusted CAD partner for projects of all sizes.

Contact us today to learn more or request a free consultation.

Conclusion

In a world where accuracy, speed, and collaboration are paramount, CAD drawing services offer undeniable value to any project. From concept development to project execution, they streamline workflows, minimize errors, and deliver professional results that align with modern expectations.

If you’re not already leveraging CAD services, now is the time to do so—and if you want results you can trust, Asset Eyes is here to help.

[idkyetxoxo]

Gwayne Hightower - Bad Things

Summary - Torn between her unfaithful husband, the fiery Daemon Targaryen, and the calm, captivating Gwayne Hightower, she finds herself drawn into a dangerous, secret affair. As the tension between passion and guilt rises, she discovers a side of herself she never knew existed.

Pairing - Gwayne Hightower reader

Warnings - Sexual content (smut!), infidelity

Word count - 2552

Masterlist for Gwayne • House of the Dragon General Masterlist

Don't matter what you say, don't matter what you do. I only wanna do bad things to you. So good that you can't explain it. What can I say? It's complicated.

In the world we inhabited, a husband's infidelity was often dismissed as a trivial misstep, a careless indulgence forgiven without consequence. 

Society reserved its harshest judgment for women who strayed, branding them with words like "treacherous" and treating their unfaithfulness as an unforgivable plague. 

The double standard was suffocating, a twisted dance where his sins were seen as forgivable lapses, while hers were considered crimes against the very fabric of morality.

For me, such hypocrisy was more than theoretical. My husband was none other than the rogue prince, Daemon Targaryen—a man as captivating as he was capricious. 

By daylight, I was his devoted wife, tethered to his stormy charm and reckless ambition. But when night fell, my heart betrayed him, its rhythms beating for another.

Gwayne Hightower. A knight of arresting beauty, with a strength of character that bewitched me from the first glance. 

Where Daemon was fire, unpredictable and consuming, Gwayne was the steady pulse of warmth I hadn't known I craved. He possessed a grace that seemed almost foreign in contrast to the chaos of my husband, and his allure became my quiet rebellion.

I remember the day we first met. 

It was hardly the beginning of a love story—our words to one another were brief, stifled by Daemon's venomous disdain for anything bearing the green crest of House Hightower. 

My husband's hatred for Gwayne should have repelled me, but it had the opposite effect. 

The very qualities that made Daemon bristle intrigued me: Gwayne's stoicism, his discipline, and the quiet power in his gaze.

What Daemon dismissed as weakness, I saw as strength. What he loathed, I longed to know. 

And so began the subtle unravelling of my loyalties, a secret tide pulling me toward the knight who embodied everything my husband was not.

That night the Great Hall was alive with the hum of courtly chatter, the golden glow of torches reflecting off the polished stone walls and casting flickering shadows over the assembled nobility. 

Daemon had insisted I attend, his arm looped possessively around mine as we made our way through the sea of finely dressed lords and ladies. 

He was, as always, the centre of attention, exuding a magnetic arrogance that made people part like waves in his wake.

I was used to being invisible beside him—a mere ornament to enhance his presence. But that night, something shifted the air. Someone.

Gwayne Hightower stood at the edge of the hall, his armour polished to a mirror shine, his green surcoat a deliberate provocation in this den of dragons. 

His tall frame was relaxed, but there was a quiet authority in his stance, a confidence that drew my eye despite my better judgment. 

He wasn't just handsome—he was devastating. 

A strong jawline, piercing eyes that seemed to see straight through me, and a slight curl to his lips that suggested he knew exactly what effect he had on the women around him.

Including me.

Our eyes met across the room, and for a moment, the bustling hall seemed to fade into silence. The intensity of his gaze was a tether, drawing me closer even though I hadn't moved an inch. 

He inclined his head slightly, the faintest smirk playing at his lips as if daring me to acknowledge the spark arcing between us.

"Don't stare," Daemon muttered, his grip on my arm tightening. I snapped out of the trance, cheeks flushed, but the fire of Gwayne's gaze lingered, burning its way under my skin. 

Daemon, for all his swagger, didn't miss much. His narrowed eyes darted toward Gwayne, and I felt the simmering tension ripple through him.

"Otto must be pleased," Daemon remarked with a caustic edge, his voice low enough for only me to hear. "The golden son playing knight so well. Pity he's wasting his talents here, don't you think?"

"Not wasted, surely," I replied, my tone breezy but my heart pounding. "A knight of his caliber elevates the court."

Daemon snorted, steering me sharply toward a group of lords before I could say more. 

Yet, even as he regaled them with some tale of his exploits, I found my thoughts drifting back to the knight.

And then he was there. 

As Daemon turned to grab a goblet of wine, Gwayne stepped into our circle, bowing with just enough deference to mask the mischief in his smile. His eyes found mine instantly as if drawn by an invisible thread.

"Prince Daemon," Gwayne said smoothly, his voice rich and self-assured. "And my lady. A pleasure to see you both tonight."

Daemon's lip curled, but he dipped his head in the faintest nod. "Hightower. Enjoying the evening?"

"Immensely," Gwayne said, his gaze never leaving mine. "Though I find myself surprised—no one warned me the dragons kept such radiant company."

The compliment was blatant, and my breath hitched at the audacity of it. 

Daemon stiffened beside me, but I could feel the heat of Gwayne's attention like a caress, sparking a blush that betrayed me.

"Careful, Ser Gwayne," Daemon drawled, his tone sharp. "Compliments like that can be misconstrued."

"Surely not, my prince," Gwayne replied, his expression the picture of innocence, though his eyes danced with amusement. "A simple truth is hardly dangerous, is it?"

Daemon gave a tight-lipped smile, but his hand on my arm was insistent, pulling me toward the far side of the hall. I let him guide me, though my heart hammered in rebellion. 

When we reached the corner of the room, I couldn't resist. I turned back, searching for Gwayne one last time.

He was already watching me.

Our eyes locked again, and for a fleeting second, I forgot where I was, who I was. His expression had softened, but there was no mistaking the intensity in his gaze. 

It felt like a promise, a challenge, and an apology all at once. 

My stomach twisted in a way I hadn't felt in years, a longing so sharp it left me breathless.

Daemon's voice cut through the haze. "Forget him," he ordered, though there was a shadow of uncertainty in his tone.

But how could I, when the memory of Gwayne's gaze burned brighter than the fire of any dragon?

─── ✦⋅♡⋅✦ ───

Nothing's that bad, if it feels good so you come back like I knew you would and we're both wild and the night's young and you're my drug.

Now, here I was, perched on Gwayne's strong, muscled thigh, rocking slowly back and forth, each movement fanning the fire that only he seemed able to quench. 

The dim light in his chambers played tricks on my mind, painting us in shadows and secrets, a tableau of longing that no one else could understand.

This was our ritual now—our stolen moments in the quiet dark. Away from prying eyes, from judgment, from the endless weight of who I was supposed to be. 

Here, with him, I could just exist.

"I've missed you," I whispered, my voice trembling as I struggled to keep the steady rhythm of my hips. 

His hands found my waist, their touch possessive but tender as he guided me effortlessly, knowing my body as though it had been crafted just for him.

"You have no idea how long I've waited for you to grace my chambers again," he murmured, his lips brushing against the sensitive skin of my neck. 

The teasing touch made me whimper, and he pulled back just enough to meet my gaze, his eyes blazing with an intensity that left me breathless.

"My sweet, desperate girl," he cooed, his thumb grazing my cheek in a way that made my heart clench. He knew exactly how to unravel me, one whispered word at a time.

"Are you going to cum for me?" he asked his voice a low, velvet whisper that sent shivers down my spine. I shook my head, not trusting my voice, knowing exactly what he wanted.

"Good," he breathed, his lips curving into a knowing smile. "Because I want to feel you come apart on me."

Effortlessly, he lifted me off his thigh, laying me back against the soft expanse of his bed. 

The loss of his touch between my legs made me ache in ways I didn't know I could, but the promise in his eyes was enough to soothe the frustration clawing at me. 

The night was young, and Gwayne had a way of making time stretch endlessly, each second a universe unto itself.

"Such beauty wasted on such a beast," he whispered, his fingers tucking a stray lock of hair behind my ear with a tenderness that belied the hunger in his movements. 

Slowly, he pressed into me, and the world fell away again, leaving only the two of us.

My back arched instinctively, my hands clutching at the sheets as he found a rhythm that felt like it had been crafted for me alone. 

He knew exactly how to drive me to the edge and pull me back, over and over, his control over my body absolute.

I traced my thumb along his lips, marvelling at the softness there before pulling him down to me, capturing his mouth in a kiss that was as desperate as it was deep. 

Our tongues fought for dominance, a battle I was more than willing to lose.

When I pulled back, gasping for breath, he rested his head on my chest, his breath warm and teasing against my skin as he licked and nipped at the flesh of my breasts. 

Each touch was a promise, a reminder of the man he was behind closed doors—the one who could break me apart and piece me back together with nothing but a look, a word, a touch.

The world outside was chaos, full of lies and half-truths, but here, in the sanctity of his arms, everything felt like bliss. 

Gwayne knew me—truly knew me. And even as guilt clawed at the edges of my conscience, I couldn't bring myself to regret it.

"You're exquisite," he murmured, his voice a husky whisper against my ear as if he couldn't help but voice the thought. His fingers traced the curve of my jaw, his thumb brushing against my bottom lip. 

"Do you feel it? How perfectly we fit?"

I nodded, unable to speak, my breath hitching as he shifted slightly, angling himself in a way that made me cry out. 

He smiled at the sound, a low, satisfied chuckle rumbling in his chest as he dipped his head to capture my lips in a kiss that was anything but gentle. 

It was hungry, consuming, the kind of kiss that left me dizzy with need.

When he pulled back, his lips were swollen, his breath ragged as he looked down at me. "I love the way you fall apart for me," he said, his voice a mixture of reverence and possession.

"Gwayne," I whispered his name like a prayer, reaching up to tangle my fingers in his hair and pull him back down to me. 

Our mouths collided again, this time slower, more tender. His tongue moved against mine with the kind of patience that drove me mad, the tension between us building with every second that passed.

He broke the kiss first, his lips trailing down my neck, pressing open-mouthed kisses against the sensitive skin there. 

My hands clutched at his back, my nails digging into the hard planes of muscle as he worked his way lower, his tongue flicking over the hollow of my throat before moving to my collarbone. 

Each touch was deliberate, his mouth mapping every inch of me as though committing me to memory.

"You taste like heaven," he murmured against my skin, his voice thick with emotion. His hands slid down my sides, his fingers leaving trails of fire in their wake. 

When his lips found my breasts, I gasped, my body arching into him as he took his time, worshipping me in a way that left me trembling beneath him. 

His mouth was warm and teasing, his tongue flicking over sensitive peaks before he sucked gently, drawing soft, desperate sounds from my lips.

"Gwayne," I breathed his name again, my voice trembling with both need and awe. He lifted his head at the sound, his gaze meeting mine. 

The intensity in his eyes made my heart stutter, his expression so open and raw that it felt as though he were baring his very soul to me.

"Say it again," he demanded softly, his thumb brushing against the curve of my cheek.

"Gwayne," I whispered, my voice cracking as emotion overwhelmed me.

His lips curved into a smile, and he leaned down to kiss me again, this time softer, more deliberate. It was as though he wanted to savour every second, to draw out the moment until it stretched into eternity. 

The slow, steady rhythm of his body against mine matched the unhurried pace of the kiss, both of us lost in the feeling of each other.

"You're everything," he murmured against my lips, his voice so low I almost didn't catch the words.

I tightened my arms around him, pulling him as close as I could.

His pace quickened slightly, just enough to push me closer to the edge, and I clung to him as though he were my lifeline. 

The sensations coursing through me were overwhelming, a flood of pleasure and emotion that left me gasping. I could feel him losing himself in the moment too, his breaths coming faster, his movements growing more erratic as we both neared that inevitable crescendo.

But even as we hurtled toward the edge, there was a tenderness in the way he touched me, a quiet reverence that made my heart ache in the best way.

When I finally shattered, it was with his name on my lips, a cry of pure ecstasy that echoed in the room around us. He followed moments later, his body trembling as he buried his face in the crook of my neck, his breath hot and ragged against my skin.

For a long moment, we just stayed like that, tangled together in the aftermath. His weight was a comforting presence against me, his heartbeat a steady rhythm that matched my own. 

He lifted his head eventually, his gaze soft as he looked down at me.

"You're everything I didn't know I needed," he said quietly, his voice filled with a sincerity that made my chest tighten.

I cupped his face with trembling hands, my thumb brushing against his cheekbone. "And you're everything I didn't think I could have," I replied, my voice breaking on the words.

He kissed me again, this time slow and lingering, as though sealing a silent promise between us. 

In that moment, it didn't matter that the world outside was waiting, or that what we were doing was forbidden. 

All that mattered was us—our shared warmth, our whispered confessions.

I used to believe love was simple, something pure and uncomplicated. But now, I realize it's a tangled mess of passion, regret, and need. 

What is betrayal, after all, but a moment of truth in a world of lies? 

And in that truth, I find a kind of freedom.

I want you forever even when we're not together scars on my body so I can take you wherever, like, I want you forever even when we're not together scars on my body I can look at you whenever.

A/n - this is purely for that one person who asked for more Gwayne and Daemon rivalry I absolutely loved writing this it was so fun!!

Gwayne tag list - @deniixlovezelda @randomnerdyfan @callsign-blue

[dragonnarrative-writes]

Generative AI Is Bad For Your Creative Brain

In the wake of early announcing that their blog will no longer be posting fanfiction, I wanted to offer a different perspective than the ones I’ve been seeing in the argument against the use of AI in fandom spaces. Often, I’m seeing the arguments that the use of generative AI or Large Language Models (LLMs) make creative expression more accessible. Certainly, putting a prompt into a chat box and refining the output as desired is faster than writing a 5000 word fanfiction or learning to draw digitally or traditionally. But I would argue that the use of chat bots and generative AI actually limits - and ultimately reduces - one’s ability to enjoy creativity.

Creativity, defined by the Cambridge Advanced Learner’s Dictionary & Thesaurus, is the ability to produce or use original and unusual ideas. By definition, the use of generative AI discourages the brain from engaging with thoughts creatively. ChatGPT, character bots, and other generative AI products have to be trained on already existing text. In order to produce something “usable,” LLMs analyzes patterns within text to organize information into what the computer has been trained to identify as “desirable” outputs. These outputs are not always accurate due to the fact that computers don’t “think” the way that human brains do. They don’t create. They take the most common and refined data points and combine them according to predetermined templates to assemble a product. In the case of chat bots that are fed writing samples from authors, the product is not original - it’s a mishmash of the writings that were fed into the system.

Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT) is a therapy modality developed by Marsha M. Linehan based on the understanding that growth comes when we accept that we are doing our best and we can work to better ourselves further. Within this modality, a few core concepts are explored, but for this argument I want to focus on Mindfulness and Emotion Regulation. Mindfulness, put simply, is awareness of the information our senses are telling us about the present moment. Emotion regulation is our ability to identify, understand, validate, and control our reaction to the emotions that result from changes in our environment. One of the skills taught within emotion regulation is Building Mastery - putting forth effort into an activity or skill in order to experience the pleasure that comes with seeing the fruits of your labor. These are by no means the only mechanisms of growth or skill development, however, I believe that mindfulness, emotion regulation, and building mastery are a large part of the core of creativity. When someone uses generative AI to imitate fanfiction, roleplay, fanart, etc., the core experience of creative expression is undermined.

Creating engages the body. As a writer who uses pen and paper as well as word processors while drafting, I had to learn how my body best engages with my process. The ideal pen and paper, the fact that I need glasses to work on my computer, the height of the table all factor into how I create. I don’t use audio recordings or transcriptions because that’s not a skill I’ve cultivated, but other authors use those tools as a way to assist their creative process. I can’t speak with any authority to the experience of visual artists, but my understanding is that the feedback and feel of their physical tools, the programs they use, and many other factors are not just part of how they learned their craft, they are essential to their art.

Generative AI invites users to bypass mindfully engaging with the physical act of creating. Part of becoming a person who creates from the vision in one’s head is the physical act of practicing. How did I learn to write? By sitting down and making myself write, over and over, word after word. I had to learn the rhythms of my body, and to listen when pain tells me to stop. I do not consider myself a visual artist - I have not put in the hours to learn to consistently combine line and color and form to show the world the idea in my head.

But I could.

Learning a new skill is possible. But one must be able to regulate one’s unpleasant emotions to be able to get there. The emotion that gets in the way of most people starting their creative journey is anxiety. Instead of a focus on “fear,” I like to define this emotion as “unpleasant anticipation.” In Atlas of the Heart, Brene Brown identifies anxiety as both a trait (a long term characteristic) and a state (a temporary condition). That is, we can be naturally predisposed to be impacted by anxiety, and experience unpleasant anticipation in response to an event. And the action drive associated with anxiety is to avoid the unpleasant stimulus.

Starting a new project, developing a new skill, and leaning into a creative endevor can inspire and cause people to react to anxiety. There is an unpleasant anticipation of things not turning out exactly correctly, of being judged negatively, of being unnoticed or even ignored. There is a lot less anxiety to be had in submitting a prompt to a machine than to look at a blank page and possibly make what could be a mistake. Unfortunately, the more something is avoided, the more anxiety is generated when it comes up again. Using generative AI doesn’t encourage starting a new project and learning a new skill - in fact, it makes the prospect more distressing to the mind, and encourages further avoidance of developing a personal creative process.

One of the best ways to reduce anxiety about a task, according to DBT, is for a person to do that task. Opposite action is a method of reducing the intensity of an emotion by going against its action urge. The action urge of anxiety is to avoid, and so opposite action encourages someone to approach the thing they are anxious about. This doesn’t mean that everyone who has anxiety about creating should make themselves write a 50k word fanfiction as their first project. But in order to reduce anxiety about dealing with a blank page, one must face and engage with a blank page. Even a single sentence fragment, two lines intersecting, an unintentional drop of ink means the page is no longer blank. If those are still difficult to approach a prompt, tutorial, or guided exercise can be used to reinforce the understanding that a blank page can be changed, slowly but surely by your own hand.

(As an aside, I would discourage the use of AI prompt generators - these often use prompts that were already created by a real person without credit. Prompt blogs and posts exist right here on tumblr, as well as imagines and headcannons that people often label “free to a good home.” These prompts can also often be specific to fandom, style, mood, etc., if you’re looking for something specific.)

In the current social media and content consumption culture, it’s easy to feel like the first attempt should be a perfect final product. But creating isn’t just about the final product. It’s about the process. Bo Burnam’s Inside is phenomenal, but I think the outtakes are just as important. We didn’t get That Funny Feeling and How the World Works and All Eyes on Me because Bo Burnham woke up and decided to write songs in the same day. We got them because he’s been been developing and honing his craft, as well as learning about himself as a person and artist, since he was a teenager. Building mastery in any skill takes time, and it’s often slow.

Slow is an important word, when it comes to creating. The fact that skill takes time to develop and a final piece of art takes time regardless of skill is it’s own source of anxiety. Compared to @sentientcave, who writes about 2k words per day, I’m very slow. And for all the time it takes me, my writing isn’t perfect - I find typos after posting and sometimes my phrasing is awkward. But my writing is better than it was, and my confidence is much higher. I can sit and write for longer and longer periods, my projects are more diverse, I’m sharing them with people, even before the final edits are done. And I only learned how to do this because I took the time to push through the discomfort of not being as fast or as skilled as I want to be in order to learn what works for me and what doesn’t.

Building mastery - getting better at a skill over time so that you can see your own progress - isn’t just about getting better. It’s about feeling better about your abilities. Confidence, excitement, and pride are important emotions to associate with our own actions. It teaches us that we are capable of making ourselves feel better by engaging with our creativity, a confidence that can be generalized to other activities.

Generative AI doesn’t encourage its users to try new things, to make mistakes, and to see what works. It doesn’t reward new accomplishments to encourage the building of new skills by connecting to old ones. The reward centers of the brain have nothing to respond to to associate with the action of the user. There is a short term input-reward pathway, but it’s only associated with using the AI prompter. It’s designed to encourage the user to come back over and over again, not develop the skill to think and create for themselves.

I don’t know that anyone will change their minds after reading this. It’s imperfect, and I’ve summarized concepts that can take months or years to learn. But I can say that I learned something from the process of writing it. I see some of the flaws, and I can see how my essay writing has changed over the years. This might have been faster to plug into AI as a prompt, but I can see how much more confidence I have in my own voice and opinions. And that’s not something chatGPT can ever replicate.

[wisteria-lodge]

What do you think a wizarding wedding would look like, and what do you think Lucius' and Narcissa's specifically looked like?

The book does show us Fleur and Bill's wedding, but that was a wartime shotgun-ish wedding in the peripherals of the story's focus. I'm also not ever sure how much of the details there are things joanne really thought about and decided to include in her representation of a Magical wedding, and how much of it are just modern social customs she might have considered the forever universal default and put in the book.

Narcissa and Lucius also seem to be the rare fictional couple who'd actually enjoy all the pedantry and tradition and specificities in a wedding to me. Seeing as you're writing a fic with them in it, I thought you'd probably already thought about this aspect of worldbuilding/character writing, so I hope you don't mind me asking abt it. Thanks and have a great day!!

Okay, I love this ask, and I'm going to lay it all out, but first I want to lay out my Reasoning.

Here are my rules, when it comes to expanding on/filling in the Harry Potter world building:

ONE: If we’re dealing with any sort of political or social structure, my reference is England, year 1700. 

This does make sense with the backstory we get: the Wizarding World split away from the Muggle world in the late 1600s, wizards live a really long time, and wizards also didn’t need an industrial revolution (because magic filled the place of tech) so they wouldn’t have gotten any of the social changes that happened because of the industrial revolution. 

Also, this particular time period generally fits with what we see on the page. Education, politics, the police force, mental health care - it all seems to work in a very 1700s way. We don’t have any electricity, there’s no industrialization. (Like, Umbridge’s pamphlets are made by hand. I mean obviously they’re made by magic, but an individual’s magic, they’re not assembled in a magical factory.) So when Draco brings up a “museum”...  it makes sense to me that he’s not not thinking of a modern museum with a ticketing department running off grants and public funding, full of typed-out little plaques written by scientists and historians, telling you the provenance of whatever you’re looking at. If we went to a museum in Wizarding World, I would expect the type of museum you saw in 1700: a cabinet of curiosities assembled by one single wealthy collector, arranged in some eccentric way, handwritten labels or no labels at all, very probably in a wing of a private house. That feels correct and in-universe to me. So… whenever someone asks me something like ‘how do taxes work in the Harry Potter universe,’ I take 1700 England as a starting place, and go from there. 

TWO: If we’re dealing with aesthetic details or inventions, I draw from England 1700 - 1880

There isn’t much that’s Victorian in the world building… but there’s plenty in the set dressing. We see lots of 1800s fashion: women wearing hats with birds and flowers on them, men wearing bowler hats and top hats. There are 1800s hedge mazes, most of the holiday decorations are from the late 1800s, we’ve got radios and trains… and I’m completely fine with all that. It seems to me that if you’re a wizard walking through the Muggle world, it’s a lot easier to see someone wearing a cool hat, and say ‘I would like a hat like that’  - versus walking around and picking up the concept of, idk unions. So cameras are okay: they’re 1800s. Note that Rita Skeeter’s photographer Bozo has a magical version of a 1850s camera

while Muggle born Colin Creevey has… a modded 1930s camera? To communicate that he’s got a foot in both worlds. 

My point is, if you saw someone riding a bicycle in Harry Potter, you would assume they brought it in from the Muggle world. Bicycles showed up in England in the 1880s, so that’s slightly too late. It’s important to the feel of the world to keep up a good chunk of separation between the aesthetics of the Wizarding World, and the aesthetics of the muggle world.

THREE: Gender politics/gendered customs basically don’t exist

This is one of the things that makes Harry Potter a J. K. Rowling fantasy world. Obviously, JKR the person has a lot to unpack about gender politics, and there are all kinds of Doylist differences between the way male and female characters are treated in the Harry Potter books. But in universe, there is no Watsonian benefit to being a guy or being a girl in any particular situation. We get gendered bathrooms (although the prefects’ bathroom and the locker rooms seem co-ed), gendered fashions, gendered dorms… and that’s basically it.  

Of course there are some very old and baked in gendered things I doubt JKR even thought about… a woman taking her husband’s last name for instance. (Honestly - I would have loved a posh doubled-barreled name for Draco. Draco Malfoy-Black sounds quite sharp and public schooly.) There’s a thing where Dumbledore mentions that the Blacks prefer it when a guy inherits… but in the same breath, he’s completely convinced Bellatrix is about to inherit, so clearly that isn’t that important.

The only other example I can think of is the way we’re told the unicorns prefer the female students. But, the boys in Professor Grubbly-Plank’s class unanimously think this is bullshit, and I would argue that the framing of the book supports this read. We haven’t seen magic work like this before, so did Professor G-P get it wrong? And/or just doesn’t want to deal with the boys? Presumably this is why we are happy Hagrid is coming back

FOUR: There is basically no organized religion/spirituality in the Wizarding World. 

The narrative does a lot of work to not tell us who the random officiant at Dumbledore's funeral and Bill and Fleur‘s wedding is. Who is he? Who does he represent? How do you find him? How does he have authority to do this? Not important, doesn’t matter, keep moving along. We are definitely in a world where there is a holiday named Christmas… but it’s like the women taking their husband's name thing, that seems too baked into JKR’s worldview to question. But there is no mention of any religious dimension, it’s just presents and feasts and balls. 

If I’m writing something that’s interested in what these guys consider to be the sacred underpinnings of their world (like something focusing on a wedding, for instance…) then I think I would end up expanding on important magical rituals. I’m thinking Fidelius, Unbreakable Vow, sacrificial magic. Not for nothing, but considering how much importance the moment where Severus and Narcissa make an Unbreakable Vow is given by both the narrative and the characters… it feels more like a wedding than the wedding does, and I’m not even a Severus/Narcissa shipper. 

*

So when it comes to weddings… I’ve honestly found it uniquely difficult to research the history there, because a lot of people are very motivated to suggest that every wedding tradition has some deep, meaningful ancient origin - or that it was just kind of always that way. Take the concept of a “best man” and the term “best man" for instance. That starts showing up in the 1780s (so it’s a social custom that doesn’t make my 1700 deadline.) Harry is of course filtering everything through his POV, but if I were writing a wedding thing, I’d want to say that Sirius is filling a different position. Like “godfather” seems a very legally important role in the wizarding society, so lean into that.  Maybe the “best man” equivalent at a wizard wedding is the person who you’ve picked to get custody of your kids if you die. 

We also see things like white wedding dresses and matching bridesmaid dresses being treated as an absolute given at Fleur’s wedding, when both of those things pretty much only exist because Queen Victoria did them in 1840. One interesting thing is that JKR doesn’t seem to do an exchange of rings, and she’s changed up that moment to make it more reminiscent of (I think) a handfasting ceremony? Which is fine, I can work with that. (Also rings are just treated very negatively across the board in the Harry Potter books. No idea why.)

But, in-universe, the Bill/Fleur wedding is really hard to use as a model for what a typical pureblood Wizarding wedding looks like. For all the reasons Anon mentions: It’s war time, it was put together very quickly, Harry is not paying the most attention, we don’t get to see the whole thing. I would also add in the fact that the Weasleys are political radicals, and at that point especially would be very politically motivated to have a wedding that looks more Muggle. 

Okay.  If I were writing a pureblood wedding… like Lucius and Narcissa’s wedding… what would I do.

First, I don’t think I want a typical wedding from the year 1700. I want 1700 does renaissance/medieval. (Kind of Sir Walter Scott.) I like this because it brings in/explains the Merlin thing - the purebloods all use ‘Merlin’ as an oath, so I guess Merlin (and Arthur, and that kind of romanticized middle ages) is important to them culturally. Also, medieval influences are going to make your wedding feel impressive and established… which is exactly what the Malfoys are after. Make sure everyone knows what an old family they are. All these pureblood families have crests, so put them everywhere, front and center. The decorations should be banners and flags with the crests of everyone attending, no florals.

I also love the idea of fossilized fashions, old-fashioned clothes that don’t come out except during a very ceremonial, traditional occasion. (Think of the ways that veils used to be a pretty normal part of a lady's wardrobe, but now you only see them during weddings.) I’d have it so that during a wizard wedding… all the ladies bring out their long, draping, evil enchantress sleeves and the guys are supposed to wear half-capes and swords. It’s also a good excuse to bring out all the really old family jewelry, of which I am sure the Malfoys have buckets.

I also want this to be a very magical wedding. Like, there are parts of it you straight-up could not participate in as muggle, because I think (sadly) that would be the vibe during the timeline of the main books. Weddings are for showing off, and part of that would be showing off your magical prowess. I’m thinking - light the dance floor on fire before the first dance, and then the couple has to perform a Flame Freezing charm. This tradition started as a screw-you to the Muggles after the witch trials… but now everybody just kinda does it because it looks really cool when the newlyweds dance on a bed of flame. Oh, and we’re definitely doing medieval-style palm-touching dances. No waltzing for the first dance at a traditional Malfoy wedding.

And they’ll go all out for the wedding feast, which will be long. The 1700s and middle ages were both really into food that did stuff - food that transformed, or food that looked like other food, or food that had birds flying out of it. So  just lean into that times a million with magic.

I am also such a sucker for slightly sentient magical houses, and Harry Potter absolutely has some of that, with the way Hogwarts (the building) has various ways to fight back against enemies and infiltrators. So I think a Malfoy wedding would definitely be taking place at Malfoy Manor, and that the house itself would be a part of the proceedings in some way. Like it’s got to accept the new family member (we know, from little moments like Umbridge being barred from Dumbledore‘s office… that sometimes magical buildings just reject you.) Integrating a new person into the new space would be a multi-step process. Maybe there’s a ceremony where they present the new person with the family spell books, and another one where they present them with keys to various parts of the house, etc.

You could tie this in with the idea of a bedding ceremony (which also hits my medieval + 1700s markers.) Maybe the house changes in some way when the couple first sleeps together, like it redecorates with the belongings of the person moving in, or grows them a rose garden or observatory so they feel more at home. I bet it’s fun for the guests to stick around and watch this change happen. (A trope like this might be especially fun in an arranged marriage or marriage-law type story.)

I’m thinking this would also be a very long wedding, and the wedding party is probably staying at the house for a week or so beforehand. That’s part of the flex, the family’s ability to adequately pay host to so many people for such a long period of time. Like that’s what a house like Malfoy Manor is for, there’s a reason those places were functionally small hotels. If at the end my old-school pureblood wedding feels like a modern muggle wedding... I don’t think I’ve done my job. A Muggleborn who’s been invited ought to have culture shock.

And yes. It goes without saying that Lucius and Narcissa would have eaten up all this pomp and circumstance, with a spoon.

[hollowed-theory-hall]

I talked about this with @a-capricious-creative and I kinda wanted to make a proper post about this:

Hermione doesn't write Harry and Ron's homework for them

I just see this point brought up sometimes (and I made the mistake of looking at Reddit), so I want to set the record straight regarding Hermione's help with Harry and Ron's schoolwork. In the books, she isn't writing their essays for them, nor does she let them copy the entire thing. Ron and Harry do their own work, and sometimes (not always) Hermione goes over it, corrects mistakes, spelling, and sometimes adds a different conclusion or, in general, refines the work; she doesn't write their work from scratch.

But, I wouldn't be me if I just said that without bringing up evidence, so, here is the evidence (You will see in the quotes that the book Hermione writes the most in Harry and Ron's homework is HBP, and before that she practiclly never helps with their homework to the degree shown there, if you needed any more reasons to criticize HBP):

More often than not, Harry and Ron do their essays on their own. They are described as studying last-minute and staying up late to finish essays after they procrastinated. They complete said last-minute essays with no help from Hermione:

Harry found Ron at the back of the library, measuring his History of Magic homework. Professor Binns had asked for a three-foot-long composition on “The Medieval Assembly of European Wizards.” “I don’t believe it, I’m still eight inches short. . . .” said Ron furiously, letting go of his parchment, which sprang back into a roll.

(CoS, Ch9)

He [Harry] replaced the top of the ink bottle; pulled an old pillowcase from under his bed; put the flashlight, A History of Magic, his essay, quill, and ink inside it; got out of bed; and hid the lot under a loose floorboard under his bed.

(PoA, Ch1)

When at the Dursleys, Harry does his summer homework of his own accord, no nagging needed. Harry actually worries and thinks about when he's going to do his homework quite a bit throughout the books.

They continued to make up predictions (which grew steadily more tragic) for another hour, while the common room around them slowly emptied as people went up to bed. Crookshanks wandered over to them, leapt lightly into an empty chair, and stared inscrutably at Harry, rather as Hermione might look if she knew they weren’t doing their homework properly.

(GoF, Ch14)

He was working flat-out just to get through all their homework, though he made a point of sending regular food packages up to the cave in the mountain for Sirius; after last summer, Harry had not forgotten what it felt like to be continually hungry.

(GoF, Ch28)

Again, Harry is working on his homework on his own while worrying about Sirius.

Now panicking slightly about the amount of homework they had to do, Harry and Ron spent their lunch hour in the library looking up the uses of moonstones in potion-making. Still angry about Ron’s slur on her woolly hats, Hermione did not join them.

(OotP, Ch13)

He had not had time to practice Vanishing Spells, had not written a single dream in his dream diary, and had not finished the drawing of the bowtruckle, nor had he written his essays. He skipped breakfast next morning to scribble down a couple of made-up dreams for Divination, their first lesson, and was surprised to find a disheveled Ron keeping him company.

(OotP, Ch13)

His homework situation, however, was now desperate, and when he returned to the Gryffindor common room he did not, though exhausted, go to bed, but opened his books and began Snape’s moonstone essay. It was half-past two by the time he had finished it. He knew he had done a poor job, but there was no help for it; unless he had something to give in he would be in detention with Snape next. He then dashed off answers to the questions Professor McGonagall had set them, cobbled together something on the proper handling of bowtruckles for Professor Grubbly-Plank, and staggered up to bed, where he fell fully clothed on top of the bed covers and fell asleep immediately.

(OotP, Ch13)

Due to Umbeidge's detentions, he had no time for homework and stayed up late to pull something together on his own. Both Harry and Ron are more likely to cobble up a subpar essay last minute than not submit anything or copy from Hermione (not that she lets them, more on that later). Also, Harry got an 'Acceptable' for McGonagall's homework described here, which I think is commendable considering the very little effort he put in.

but Harry pulled out his Potions book and set to work to finish his essay, though he was only pretending to concentrate and, by the time that Ron said he was going to bed too, had written hardly anything. Midnight came and went while Harry was reading and rereading a passage about the uses of scurvy-grass, lovage, and sneezewort and not taking in a word of it. . . .

(OotP, Ch18)

Again, Harry is working on his homework on his own.

Having wasted a lot of time worrying aloud about Apparition, Ron was now struggling to finish a viciously difficult essay for Snape that Harry and Hermione had already completed. Harry fully expected to receive low marks on his, because he had disagreed with Snape on the best way to tackle dementors, but he did not care

(HBP, Ch21) - Harry and Hermione clearly didn't write the same essay, and Ron is writing another essay on his own.

Harry refers to his own homework workload a lot, and complains about having to do all of it and having no time for it. If he was copying everything off Hermione, that would not be the case:

Perhaps it was because he was now so busy, what with Quidditch practice three evenings a week on top of all his homework, but Harry could hardly believe it when he realized that he’d already been at Hogwarts two months.

(PS, Ch10)

Meanwhile Professor Binns, the ghost who taught History of Magic, had them writing weekly essays on the goblin rebellions of the eighteenth century. Professor Snape was forcing them to research antidotes. They took this one seriously, as he had hinted that he might be poisoning one of them before Christmas to see if their antidote worked. Professor Flitwick had asked them to read three extra books in preparation for their lesson on Summoning Charms.

(GoF, Ch15)

“I hope she [Umbridge] doesn’t keep me too long this evening. You realize we’ve got to write three essays, practice Vanishing Spells for McGonagall, work out a countercharm for Flitwick, finish the bowtruckle drawing, and start that stupid dream diary for Trelawney?”

(OotP, Ch13) - about his detention with Umbridge.

And sometimes, all three do homework together. Hermione is not the only one sitting long hours in the library over homework; they all do, and they all write their own essays with different conclusions and different grades:

They piled so much homework on them that the Easter holidays weren’t nearly as much fun as the Christmas ones. It was hard to relax with Hermione next to you reciting the twelve uses of dragon’s blood or practicing wand movements. Moaning and yawning, Harry and Ron spent most of their free time in the library with her, trying to get through all their extra work.

(PS, Ch14)

“Wonder what it’s like to have a peaceful life,” Ron sighed, as evening after evening they struggled through all the extra homework they were getting. Hermione had now started making study schedules for Harry and Ron, too. It was driving them nuts.

(PS, Ch14)

“Why would anyone want to celebrate the day they died?” said Ron, who was halfway through his Potions homework and grumpy. “Sounds dead depressing to me. . . .”

(CoS, Ch8)

Harry, Ron, and Hermione chose seats as far as possible from Percy in the common room that night. Ron was still in a very bad temper and kept blotting his Charms homework.

(CoS, Ch9)

“How’s she doing it?” Ron muttered to Harry one evening as Harry sat finishing a nasty essay on Undetectable Poisons for Snape. Harry looked up. Hermione was barely visible behind a tottering pile of books.

(PoA, Ch12)

Neville actually asks Harry for help with his own homework (Harry isn't seen as a bad student by others; that being said, it is DADA which is his best subject):

“Er — not now — I was going to go to the library and do that vampire essay for Lupin —” “I’ll come with you!” said Neville brightly. “I haven’t done it either!” “Er — hang on — yeah, I forgot, I finished it last night!” “Great, you can help me!” said Neville, his round face anxious.

(PoA, Ch14)

Hermione herself is against just letting Harry and Ron copy her homework, and repeatedly doesn't let Harry and Ron do so:

Harry, Ron, and Hermione sat together next to a window. Hermione was checking Harry and Ron’s Charms homework for them. She would never let them copy (“How will you learn?”), but by asking her to read it through, they got the right answers anyway.

(PS, Ch11)

“You know, we probably should try and get more homework done during the week,” Harry muttered to Ron, as they finally laid aside Professor McGonagall’s long essay on the Inanimatus Conjurus spell and turned miserably to Professor Sinistra’s equally long and difficult essay about Jupiter’s moons. “Yeah,” said Ron, rubbing slightly bloodshot eyes and throwing his fifth spoiled bit of parchment into the fire beside them. “Listen . . . shall we just ask Hermione if we can have a look at what she’s done?” Harry glanced over at her; she was sitting with Crookshanks on her lap and chatting merrily to Ginny as a pair of knitting needles flashed in midair in front of her, now knitting a pair of shapeless elf socks. “No,” he said heavily, “you know she won’t let us.”

(OotP, Ch14)

When we do see her help them, she never writes the whole essay for them; she usually corrects the essays they wrote and occasionally adds to them:

It was really lucky that Harry now had Hermione as a friend. He didn’t know how he’d have gotten through all his homework without her, what with all the last-minute Quidditch practice Wood was making them do. She had also lent him Quidditch Through the Ages, which turned out to be a very interesting read.

(PS, Ch11)

She helps Harry go through his homework when he doesn't have time for it; he goes through it himself, too. She is helping by summarizing information (as we see later), not doing it for him. (I also want to note Hermione read Quidditch Through the Ages, she knows Quidditch, she just isn't passionate about it).

“Don’t start arguing again,” said Harry wearily, as Ron opened his mouth to retaliate. “Can’t we just . . . Let’s just do that homework, get it out of the way. . . .” They collected their schoolbags from a corner and returned to the chairs by the fire. People were coming back from dinner now. Harry kept his face averted from the portrait hole, but could still sense the stares he was attracting. “Shall we do Snape’s stuff first?” said Ron, dipping his quill into his ink. “ ‘The properties . . . of moonstone . . . and its uses . . . in potion-making . . .’ ” he muttered, writing the words across the top of his parchment as he spoke them. “There.” He underlined the title, then looked up expectantly at Hermione. “So what are the properties of moonstone and its uses in potion- making?” [...] “Anyway . . .” He [Ron] rolled up the parchment on which he had written the title of Snape’s essay. “There’s no point trying to finish this now, I can’t do it without Hermione, I haven’t got a clue what you’re supposed to do with moonstones, have you?” Harry shook his head, noticing as he did so that the ache in his right temple was getting worse. He thought of the long essay on giant wars and the pain stabbed at him sharply. Knowing perfectly well that he would regret not finishing his homework tonight when the morning came, he piled his books back into his bag.

(OotP, Ch13)

Again, Harry does his own homework and schedules when he does which assignment for himself. And sometimes, they work together; there is nothing wrong with studying together or writing essays together. This isn't cheating.

Ron is attempting to get Hermione to explain what he needs to write so he won't have to track a book to read it in, but she doesn't help him in this situation, and later Harry and Ron go to the library to research for this essay on their own:

Now panicking slightly about the amount of homework they had to do, Harry and Ron spent their lunch hour in the library looking up the uses of moonstones in potion-making.

(OotP, Ch13) - I brought this quote up earlier, but this is the context. Harry and Ron sometimes have Hermione summarize research for them instead of going to the library. This is often what her help looks like.

When she does help, it usually looks like this:

“Jupiter’s biggest moon is Ganymede, not Callisto,” she said, pointing over Ron’s shoulder at a line in his Astronomy essay, “and it’s Io that’s got the volcanos.” [...] “Give them to me, I’ll look through them and correct them,” she said. “Are you serious? Ah, Hermione, you’re a lifesaver,” said Ron, “what can I — ?” “What you can say is, ‘We promise we’ll never leave our homework this late again,’ ” she said, holding out both hands for their essays, but she looked slightly amused all the same. “Thanks a million, Hermione,” said Harry weakly, passing over his essay and sinking back into his armchair, rubbing his eyes. It was now past midnight and the common room was deserted but for the three of them and Crookshanks. [...] “Okay, write that down,” Hermione said to Ron, pushing his essay and a sheet covered in her own writing back to Ron, “and then copy out this conclusion that I’ve written for you.” [...] said Hermione. “Harry, yours is okay except for this bit at the end, I think you must have misheard Professor Sinistra, Europa’s covered in ice, not mice — Harry?”

(OotP, Ch14)

Again, context, it's past midnight, and Harry is having a Voldemort-induced migraine. They've procrastinated the essays until the last moment, but they wrote them. Hermione checks them over and corrects them, but she isn't writing them for them.

All that day she [Hermione] seemed to be in a particularly good mood, and that evening in the common room she even consented to look over (in other words, finish writing) Harry’s Herbology essay, something she had been resolutely refusing to do up to this point, because she had known that Harry would then let Ron copy his work.

(HBP, Ch20)

Again, Hermione doesn't help them as often as some fans say, because she wants them to learn. And again, she corrects and helps finish an already written essay, and Ron, apparently, copies Harry's essays sometimes (at least per HBP that started dumbing both boys, but especially Ron, down...).

“Ah no!” said Ron, staring horror-struck at the parchment. “Don’t say I’ll have to write the whole thing out again!” “It’s okay, we can fix it,” said Hermione, pulling the essay toward her and taking out her wand. “I love you, Hermione,” said Ron, sinking back in his chair, rubbing his eyes wearily.

(HBP, Ch21)

Hermione again checks over already written essays and corrects Ron's spelling errors caused by Fred & George's jinxed quill; she isn't writing the whole thing.

Hence why Harry, Ron, and Hermione get different grades often enough because they aren't submitting the same essays, nor are they always working on them together (even Harry and Ron don't always do their homework together, though they help each other more often than Hermione helps either of them). Hermione never wrote their whole essays for them; she corrected and reviewed them, and there is a huge difference. She actually compliments Harry's essays sometimes as being good. Regardless, Ron and Harry still sat in the library/common room and stayed up late to write their essays on their own more often than not. Ron and Neville see Harry as a good enough student to copy his essays from him in certain subjects (and sometimes, Ron's essays are better than Harry's. Though I'd say Harry is more inclined to put slightly more effort into his essays than Ron usually is, if he has time. Harry also doesn't like setting homework off for the last minute, and it's Ron who repeatedly convinces him to do so:

Harry felt a small twinge of guilt at the thought of the pile of homework awaiting him upstairs, but the sky was a clear, exhilarating blue, and he had not been on his Firebolt for a week. . . . “I mean, we can do it tonight,” said Ron, as he and Harry walked down the sloping lawns toward the Quidditch pitch, their broomsticks over their shoulders

(OotP, Ch14)

I love Ron, but he is a bad influence on Harry when it comes to his schoolwork. Harry actually read through his school books before first year:

He had decided to call her Hedwig, a name he had found in A History of Magic. His school books were very interesting. He lay on his bed reading late into the night

(PS, Ch6)

Harry just: a. stops caring when he sees no one else really cares b. he gets good enough grades without caring c. has so much other shit on his mind, give him a break).

So can this fanon that Hermione does all their essays be put to rest, please? Harry and Ron's 'A's, 'E's, and occasional 'O's are their own, not Hermione's.

(Also, considering how last-minute Harry and Ron tend to do their homework, the fact that they average on 'A's and 'E's for most subjects is absolutely a testament to them being intelligent and decent bullshiters)

[costumersupportdept]

I have developed a Theory that the reason so many theaters seem to have absolutely batshit bureaucratic/management problems is a twofold miasma of stupidity that it takes a lot of willpower/clarity to NOT get sucked into.

1)The Peter Principle/"failing up." Laurence J Peter describes this as "employees (being) promoted based on their success in previous jobs until they reach a level at which they are no longer competent, as skills in one job do not necessarily translate to another. " I, while a pretty good draper (costume patternmaker) and a reasonably good costume team lead, am absolutely abhorrent at dealing with paperwork beyond what I need to do the actual costuming. I do not enjoy or do well with spreadsheets or budgeting or trying to assemble work calendars. I do not want to do jobs that take that.

HOWEVER: Miasma 2.

2) The only way to get paid more is to move up (usually). This means that if I want to make more than I'm currently making at the top of one hierarchy, I have to move into a different one, and that one is the personnel management and spreadsheet one. Since theater is a low paying gig at the best of times, people will generally jump at chances to make more money if they can get them.

Which creates its own twofold nightmare- people who get promoted may not actually know what they're doing in the spreadsheets and personnel end of the world, AND/OR you've just taken a Really Good artist out of the Art end of things and plopped them into the Paperwork end of things, sometimes with a promise that they will still get to Art (spoiler, that rarely works out).

So SINCE theater is a mediocre paying job AT BEST, there's almost an enforced scramble into higher and higher levels *away* from The Art, which means (back to the Peter Principle) you wind up with admin folks who may have been great artists, but are NOT equipped be businesspeople or Leaders of Men (in the generic) at all.

And it takes a LOT of stubborn refusal to budge and boundary drawing to be a person who WANTS TO STAY IN THE ART, because that subtle/sometimes not subtle push upwards for $$ is always happening.

Now, how do we fix it? Well, it's going to have to be a multipronged approcach, but I know we could START with paying the Art Level Folks more to calm down the aggressive climb upwards.

[skitchune]

#01 G8 Draw-in-your-style Challenge!

I believe that this is an old challenge, but I decided that there’s no better way to dust off the old gear than seeing the boys in my style. Really liked playing around the filters. I liked given them this old, Sunday Morning Comics style. The grain is just beautiful.

I guess…I should give a little explanation?

Basically, in how I write Hetalia, there was ONE major event that changed the course of their timeline during WW2. Though the world mythos in itself is very different, suffice to say that it was that ONE event that changed the course of their world moving forward. Currently, the Nation Folks assemble as their own private entity to develop livelihood and development projects for underserved communities across the globe, instead of other global matters. Still, many retain a degree of political connection, Nation Folks, in general, all agree that they will always put first the good of humanity over the gain of any singular country. That being said…

🍝 Feliciano Vargas - more actively sexual and flirtatious, pretty much a ladies man, has a problem keeping his dick out of places it shouldn’t be but he’s a lovable tramp regardless and knows that he can get away with a lot. He has a good heart and a good head, but maybe a little bit of too much casual machismo that makes his comeuppance so fun to watch.

📋Ludwig Beilschmidt - still pretty much stiff and serious, efficient but also too much of a stickler, is the youngest of the bunch and always has something to prove, Gilbert helps him here and there but he doesn’t want Gil to meddle, it may frustrate him that everyone treats him like a kid, but he also knows that it sometimes works in his favor being the ‘spoiled’ baby brother to many.

🐉 Seiryuu Honda - to keep things short, Seiryuu is and always has been this universe’s Nation Folk for Japan but Kiku does/did exist for some time for [story reasons] Sei is calm, level-headed but can come off as rather aloof and dazed, he can act a little too familiar with new people and is quite affectionate to friends. He’s a bit of a Casanova and likes the game of courtship like a round of Shogi. In many ways he might not be stereotypical, but in many ways he comes off as traditional and anachronistic.

🤠Alfred Jones - Heroism runs deep in this hot-blooded cowpoke, not the flashy guns or the prestige, but the hard work of running down the pavement for change. He’s charming, mature, headstrong, and value honest and just work. He’s the singular cause of the ONE event, becoming a catalyst to multiple OTHER notable events during WW2. Unfortunately, this has caused him excommunicated from the US government, which suits him fine as he can more actively participate in projects.

🎸Arthur Kirkland - No one fucks around with the ruling class more than Art, who has historically been a thorn in many administrations throughout the colorful history of his homeland. He is a rebel with a cause down to his core, sticking it up anyone’s arse if it means fighting for what’s right. Boston Tea Party? He was also pissing on the cartons before throwing them overboard? The IRA? Girl, he was a damn recruiter. Has he been beaten, threatened, and killed because of his insolence? Sure, but no one is gonna look good as him doing it.

⛱️Francis Bonnefoy - (P.S. I meant to draw him removing his shirt because someone accidentally spilled wine on him) Residing far away from the bustle of Paris, Franc lives the coastal orchard life along the south of France. He’s a country boy at heart who likes living the simple life. He is very introspective, usually keeps to himself, but isn’t really afraid to voice out his measured opinions. Some might say he is a tad but wistful, but many friends know he’s just daydreaming of being back in his orchard surrounded by good company and a glass of the finest wine.

💅Ivan Braginsky - No one can take this MATERIAL GWORL. Daddy Russia is a Mama Bear who claps back at heartless Capitalism and works tirelessly as the acting Chairman of the Union to increase wages and living conditions across the social classes. He is tongue-in-cheek, no nonsense, and fabulous, but above all, a big and caring figure who thinks much for others more than himself sometimes and is just grateful to come home and be wrapped around by a certain Lithuanian’s strong arms—Big Mama deserves some honey after a long day’s work.

🍜Yao Wang - Wang is a funny characters to me. He can come across as uncouth and overfamiliar, but he just doesn’t take life as seriously as the others. It’s been a long ride and there’s too much more ground to cover than he wishes to put the effort into. He likes to complain about the silliest things, but damn, if he isn’t telling the truth every time he opens his mouth.

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