A tailored colony is a colony set up to meet certain criteria by its founders. Tailored colonies have been founded to:

*replicate a given historical period (or an idealized version of it).  (The Nipponese Cultural Preserves NCP-1 and NPC-2 simulating Samurai culture for examples)

*an ideal world for a given religious or social group (The farming worlds of the Mennonites and Stellar Amish)

*an asthetic ideal (the ice world of Glacia for example, with its ice sculpted cities and items).

*designed with a given ideal (the aquatic world of Spylos IV, where aquatically modified Aldollians live, or the Ayrie where genemodded winged Native Americans live).

The volunteer colonists are pychoengineered and often genegineered to match the vision of the founders. Sometimes the colonists are freeborn synths (Synthetics with the ability to reproduce, illegal in most places).

Initial constructions and some limited geoforming is performed to make sure everything is idea for the colony.

Tailored colonies help explain the One Dimensional nature of some worlds or the "near Earthstock" aliens (Dog people, Cat People, Fish People) that live there.