about this site

Appledust started around 2004-2005ish, and was originally named d0peland (I was a bit of an edgelord as a teen). It was inspired by the pixel adoptable community on Neopets, which is also where I learned how to code basic HTML. Since then, I got a free website on Geocities and then Angelfire, then to Homestead. All of these site hosts became obsolete and my hard work was ruined. I eventually got my own domain for my actual art portfolio, and decided to add my pixel site to it as well.

Over the years, people lost interest in the personal website thing, and moved onto platforms like Myspace and eventually Facebook, Insta, etc. There's still pixel artists on places like tumblr and Deviantart but the "adopting" of other people's pixels and the community aspect isn't like it was back then. I have kept my adopted pixels from other pixel sites in my toybox (under the ME tab), but most of the links are broken. It's just a bit of nostalgia for me to relive.

my first layout which was on Neopets. Inspired by Cafe Pupu characters from Barunson

My layouts are all drawn by me in Adobe Photoshop with a pen tablet, but early on it was 100% pixelled by mouse in MS Paint. I usually followed the "kawaii" or cute Japanese style which was popular with pixel websites, but eventually added a bit more of my style.

one of my less kawaii style layouts. not sure what was the theme here... quirky?

In 2020, I decided after about 8 years of no updates, to refresh Appledust and I made a new layout based on the pastel goth/creepy cute aesthetic. This is a perfect representation of who I am since I've always been obsessed with cute stuff but also am a total goth (even though I may not rock black lipstick anymore). I also updated some of my old pixels to have a more clean look and more cohesive colours.

here i wanted a more colorful layout that included unicorns. i also got more adventurous with coding, and used a lot of divs everywhere.