Character Blog #2: The design process of San Marco

(full pic here)

Saluti! This character design blog post was chosen by a vote among the paid Patreon members, so this week we'll be taking a look at WB's la gatta herself, San Marco.

San Marco is one of Waifu Britannica's original characters, so she's designed from scratch rather than having one of Claivin's  Waifu Universalis girls to draw reference from. Usually when I design one of these WB OC girls I would think "Do I draw inspiration for the design from a historical figure or from an artwork from the period? Do I focus a design based more on history or the local culture?" Also, since it is my own OC instead of Claivin's, my own personal biases also tend to (ahem) exert more influence onto the design.

So to get an idea how San Marco was designed, we would need to first understand what the Republic of San Marco is, in both history and how it is depicted in Victoria 3.

 

The Republic of San Marco was a revolutionary republic centred on Venice that existed from 17 March 1848 to 28 August 1849. Inspired by the Five Days of Milan revolt days earlier (which kicked the Austrian garrison from the city), Venice declared independence from Austria and aligned itself with Sardinia-Piedmont during the First Italian War of Independence. The revolt of Milan and Venice against the Habsburgs marked the catalyst of the Risorgimento.

In Victoria 3 however, the Republic of San Marco is an amalgamation of the Five Days of Milan and Venice's declaration of independence. Mechanically, it represents the Italians' desire for liberation against foreign occupation.
Hence, while players will usually see it pop up in Lombardy–Venetia (since that's the only Italian lands that's held by non-Italian nations in the game), where San Marco pops up in-game is actually dynamic so as long as a the Risorgimento has started and non-Italian nations that holds land in Italy suffers a cultural secession revolt by North or South Italian populations.
 Some flag and dynamic country names the Waifu Britannica mod adds in for San Marco that's dependent on where her capital is

In other words, San Marco (the country) represents the Risorgimento. So San Marco (the character) must be a representation of the Risorgimento.

So who better to represent the Risorgimento himself than the man, the legend, the Hero of the Two Worlds himself, Giuseppe Garibaldi!

Garibaldi was an Italian general, revolutionary, and republican who led the Kingdom of Sardinia-Piedmont on military campaigns that led to the unification of Italy. But before this when he was still living in exile in South America, he fought against Brazil in the Ragamuffin War and fought on the side of the Colorados in the Uruguayan Civil War with his Italian Redshirt volunteers. This man was indeed very busy.

San Marco's outfit design hence borrows very liberally from Garibaldi's fit. The red shirts that he and his volunteers (known as the Redshirts) wore is an iconic look for Garibaldi. The outfit that he uses in the painting 'Portrait of Giuseppe Garibaldi During the Landing of Thousand at Marsala by Gerolamo Induno' is the exact outfit that San Marco uses in order to invoke Garibaldi's imagery (with heavy creative liberties of course). To balance out the look and to not make the head look too naked (that one ear will be cold), she also uses the smoking cap that Garibaldi can be seen using in some photographs.

The shorts and thigh high boots she's given are of course the aforementioned creative liberties to Garibaldi's outfit. As she's a... errr.... very curvaceous catgirl, that combo was given to accentuate her figure.

*gasps* a Genshin? Impacting my blog??

Speaking of catgirls, it was an easy decision to decide whether to make her a kemonomimi or not, as she already bore the name of Saint Mark and hails from the city where his lion sleeps. While she herself is not a winged lion (sorry), she was nevertheless given ears, a tail and blonde hair to invoke that lioness feel. The Lion of Saint Mark is also a centuries old symbol of Venice, so it was a no brainer for her to be depicted as a lioness.

I believe that when I was designing San Marco, the Genshin Impact character Kirara was released not too long ago (that or there was an event involving her). Her design made an impact (hehe) on me when I returned to play the game, so San Marco's pose and ponytail was strongly influenced by Kirara.

As to why she's so thicc, I will only leave you guys with this screenshot from the WB Discord😌

...........................................................................................................................................................................................

So that's a wrap for San Marco's design process! I hope anyone reading this enjoys it! While this blog and the previous one was one week between each other, I cannot guarantee that the blogs will come once per week. These blogs will eventually be made public access, though only after the blog immediately afterwards has been released for paid supporters.
Anyway, the next blog will be about Beiyang, another WB OC and another pick suggested by paid Patreon supporters. Until then!