Moonlit Spiral: Helix and the city of Dahl (Patreon)

I've kind of purposefully slowed down on sharing Moonlit Spiral stuff because the pages are taking me longer than I initially anticipated. I unfortunately had to extend my deadline which means the pub date has been moved to spring/summer 2026. I'd much rather share a bulk of stuff closer up to the book's release; not two years before. So I'll likely keep most of this year's posts with sharing concept art and share more page-making stuff in 2025. I did, however, finish linework for page 171 of 300 today after a very tough week's worth of work so I'm happy with my current progress.

Anyhoo, I thought it'd be a nice change of pace to share some world-building stuff rather than the usual character work. I'll keep this particular post pretty short though because I'm well aware that this type of artwork probably isn't the most exciting thing for most folks here. I happen to love drawing stuff like this though. I find it very relaxing just noodling away at fictional architecture, slowly constructing a world line by line.

In the case of Dahl, the city where our adventurers depart for their journey from, I was inspired by a lot of Eastern Asian design: particularly the curved, multi-layered roofing on towers that you might be somewhat familiar with. I also always liked how in a lot of Disney classics, such as Pinocchio and Tangled, the artists will compositionally stack buildings on and next to each other. I kinda meshed those elements along with some spiral motifs to create the framework of Dahl. It sits near the center of a hilly, mountain region (Helix) so it also structurally made sense to situate my buildings that way.

Part of the idea behind the world of Helix is rather than multiple separate cultures, it's just one giant hodgepodge of a bunch of them. For example, there's a museum full of Greek elements and later in the story our protagonists enter a small town inspired by Spanish markets. But because the themes of the story lean more Eastern Asian, I wanted to make sure those features were not simply sprinkled throughout, but also the most prominent.

And with that I'm running off to work on page 172. Have a fantastic weekend, my friends!

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