The efficiency of light coupling to electromagnetic modes such as surface plasmon polariton (SPP) represents a very important issue in plasmonics and laser-based processing. On the other hand, hydrodynamic effects that are developed after relaxation of an excited material has proven to determine the features of the induced topography. Thus, the investigation of the combined impact of the two mechanisms is crucial for a systematic determination of the laser conditions that lead to topographies with desired morphological features. To this end, in this talk, two special cases of laser processing are presented: (i) patterning of solids with a train of temporarily separated (double) pulses that consists of a spatiotemporal intensity combination including one pulse with Gaussian and another with periodically modulated intensity distribution created by Direct Laser Interference Patterning (DLIP) (Fig.1a), and (ii) patterning of metal pre-patterned surfaces with linearly polarised beams of variable laser polarisation with respect to the orientation of the prepatterned ridges. In the former case, it was shown that both the spatial intensity of the double pulse and the effective number of pulses per irradiation spot are important to control the formation of complex surface morphologies [1-2]. On the other hand, for laser processing of prepatterned surfaces, it is demonstrated that for polarisation parallel to the ridges [3], laser induced periodic surface structures (LIPSS) are formed perpendicularly to the pre-pattern with a frequency that is independent of the distance between the ridges and periodicities close to the wavelength of the excited SPP. By contrast, for polarisation perpendicular to the pre-pattern, the periodicities of the LIPSS are closely correlated to the distance between the ridges for pre-pattern distance larger than the laser wavelength. To elucidate the surface patterning, the underlying physical processes behind the complex patterns’ generation were interpreted in terms of a multiscale model that combines electron excitation and electromagnetic phenomena with melt hydrodynamics. The aforementioned study demonstrates that the elucidation of the combined role of electromagnetic and hydrothermal phenomena can constitute a significant step forward towards producing laser induced surface structures on demand by tailoring surface processing related effects.