My Exorcised Coven Cottage

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Exorcised? Hardly. This cottage is haunted by every spook, spectre and skeleton possible. This is the Samhain, or Halloween, themed home, and I've done my best to decorate it in that theme. There are all manners of dead, undead and scary inhabitants that I could find, as well as a strong Wiccan or witches vibe, with all sorts of decoration in that vein. Lastly, to symolize the harvest and the Reaper, there's a strong harvest tide vibe to the house, with many harvested pumpkins and wheat stacks.

This house was really fun to make, it's a lot different from what I usually do, and I spent the better part of this Witches Festival tracking down some items for the house, as well as using the Witches and Hollowjack pack. But most of all, it was fun to make because there are so many slots for the size. Even with all the clutter I have put in, and I don't think I can fit any more at all now, there's still almost 40 slots left! This is how you make houses, ZOS, take note! We want to be able to decorate our houses, and these medum size houses fit the bill.

So, the house includes a large pumpkin patch with some harvest decoration, a graveyard with undead and crow wraiths, a small bog area, an outdoor witches shrine, and of course an interior that is packed with scary litterature, potions and poisons, a large kitchen area with harvested pumpkins and produce, and a witches cauldron. The video below will take you through all of the points of interest, and I will post some screenshots in the following posts. I hope you enjoy the look, I surely enjoyed making it. Have a happy Samhain or Halloween, and enjoy the harvest season!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ENeh3vqCd_s

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Pumkin patch and harvest area





The Witches shrine


The bog

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The graveyard





Ouside the cottage

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The cottage interior

RobotSparkles

This is one of my favorite houses in the game, and you've done an amazing job! I LOVE your interior.

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RobotSparkles wrote: »

This is one of my favorite houses in the game, and you've done an amazing job! I LOVE your interior.

Thank you! I really like this one as well. The new furniture that we got this year was a great help, the wheat sheafs, the additional pumpkins, the witches decorations, and coupled with the Hollowjack pack which had a lot of interesting and unique items, it was possible to really get into the whole Samhain feeling with this house. The wheat sheafs will make a return with the New Life home later this year, I already have some plans for that one.
Also, the furniture limit really helped with this one, I managed to clutter up the interior as much as possible, there was no stupid item limit holding me back this time, which was great.

NoTimeToWait

Really cool! The graveyard is totally awesome.Though I feel that your little swamp area is a bit underdeveloped and a couple sacks of grain and peas are missing in your interior

I was trying to make a hobbit hole of mine, but still can't find a way around the fog and swamp, and rainy weather. You know, my hairy feet need to bask in a bright sunlight...

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NoTimeToWait wrote: »

Really cool! The graveyard is totally awesome.Though I feel that your little swamp area is a bit underdeveloped and a couple sacks of grain and peas are missing in your interior

I was trying to make a hobbit hole of mine, but still can't find a way around the fog and swamp, and rainy weather. You know, my hairy feet need to bask in a bright sunlight...

Yeah the bog area doesnt have much going on. I did add some swamp trees, the mists of the Hag Fen and the glowing thistles, which I really like and which work well as a kind of spooky will-o-wisp kind of flower.
Not sure what else to do about it, really, you could put some more trees there, but that would just clog it up too much and block off the view. And since it's a swampy area, there's not much you can place there. Plus the ground is sloping very much down, so it's an awkward angle to place anything on the ground.
Might place a few mushrooms there perhaps, though I tend to keep most of my fungal vegetation for my Tel Galen and Dunmer themed homes.

The grain sacks are Crown Store only. I bought a couple, one for the outside wagon and one for the inside, but I'm a little wary of simply buying lots of these form the store, seeing as such a basic item should really have been craftable to begin with.

Delphinia

You definitely made good use out of all the seasonal furnishings:)
I love how the interior looks so lively for a place housing so much “death”. Well done!

spartaxoxo

About your bog...

I would add some firewood that is all charred around and sink it into the ground, a couple of dead trees, and then add various remains into the ground. I would in particular make sure to add some of those sacrificial remains that should be coming up this week at the luxury vendor, iirc. It would make them look like partially preserved corpses from the bog.

If you can get your hands on a few of those witch totems with the green smog, sink those into the ground too around the firewood.

Get some of those totem skeleton hands and have them come up from the dirt. Maybe some dark rocks as well.

Just look at some images of peat bogs, they should be sufficiently spooky and easy enough to make eso spooky.

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Delphinia wrote: »

You definitely made good use out of all the seasonal furnishings:)
I love how the interior looks so lively for a place housing so much “death”. Well done!

Thank you, that was very essential for me yes. I like the spooky Halloween themed decor, but I didn't want a cottage full of death and torture stuff, so I deliberately avoided all the Daedric stuff.

Personally I love the autumn season, it's a season to remember life's passing and inevitable end, as nature and the world around us decay and prepare for winter. Hence the "death" association with the old festival of Samhain, and modern Halloween. But it is also a season of bounty, of harvest and of reaping. With all the pumpkins, apples, grain and wheat and other agricultural symbols and produce, I tried to symbolize the whole "harvest" aspect of the season, a time to reap what has been sowed, to enjoy the last bounty before winter arrives. At least for me it gives the house a bit more depth and symbolism, other than simply being a "spooky" and slightly gimmicky home with lots of Halloween gags.

@spartaxoxo Thanks for the suggestions, but I think I will leave the bog area as it is now. I kind of like the minimalistic look with the swamp trees and the glowing thistles. The witches sacrificial remains are indeed coming this weekend, but I have taken a look at them, and I find them a little too grotesque for my home. They would fit in an evil Hagraven themed house (like they are originally intended in the base game zones where you see them), or perhaps in a slightly morbid torture room or something like that, but I think they are a bit too morbid for the tone I was going for with this house.

spartaxoxo

Carbonised wrote: »

Delphinia wrote: »

You definitely made good use out of all the seasonal furnishings:)
I love how the interior looks so lively for a place housing so much “death”. Well done!

Thank you, that was very essential for me yes. I like the spooky Halloween themed decor, but I didn't want a cottage full of death and torture stuff, so I deliberately avoided all the Daedric stuff.

Personally I love the autumn season, it's a season to remember life's passing and inevitable end, as nature and the world around us decay and prepare for winter. Hence the "death" association with the old festival of Samhain, and modern Halloween. But it is also a season of bounty, of harvest and of reaping. With all the pumpkins, apples, grain and wheat and other agricultural symbols and produce, I tried to symbolize the whole "harvest" aspect of the season, a time to reap what has been sowed, to enjoy the last bounty before winter arrives. At least for me it gives the house a bit more depth and symbolism, other than simply being a "spooky" and slightly gimmicky home with lots of Halloween gags.

@spartaxoxo Thanks for the suggestions, but I think I will leave the bog area as it is now. I kind of like the minimalistic look with the swamp trees and the glowing thistles. The witches sacrificial remains are indeed coming this weekend, but I have taken a look at them, and I find them a little too grotesque for my home. They would fit in an evil Hagraven themed house (like they are originally intended in the base game zones where you see them), or perhaps in a slightly morbid torture room or something like that, but I think they are a bit too morbid for the tone I was going for with this house.

Yeah, I can definitely understand that. It was just a suggestion mostly cuz you said you werent sure about it. Those bog forests are harvested, so I figured, I'd make the suggestion. I actually like the area just the way it is too. Happy Halloween

Azurya

awesome

NoTimeToWait

Carbonised wrote: »

The grain sacks are Crown Store only. I bought a couple, one for the outside wagon and one for the inside, but I'm a little wary of simply buying lots of these form the store, seeing as such a basic item should really have been craftable to begin with.

I quite like orcish grain sacks. They are both cheap and good-looking.
https://eso.mmo-fashion.com/orcish-sack-grain/
https://eso.mmo-fashion.com/orcish-sack-bean/

kind_hero

Amazing details! I visited it and can say it looks like it is part of a quest. The devs should check it out

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kind_hero wrote: »

Amazing details! I visited it and can say it looks like it is part of a quest. The devs should check it out

Next year we'll do a miniquest there =D And thank you! Here are some pictures from our spooky evening at the cottage!