Erotica 2002
Nov. 25th, 2002 05:58 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lprovenI remember when this was launched and viewed as either scandalous or merely sad.
Now, it's almost mainstream - and popular and well-attended. Plus ça change.
So Kjersti & I decided it was time we went.
It was kinda fun. Not sure it was really worth the money, though.
Some very odd stands... some kind of Sodastream gadget, a home sauna company, a car sales stand...
Lots of pervy/fetish stuff.
An arts section, ranging from excellent to crap.
Some great fun furniture stands. Clothing ranging from good to shite - some you'd find at any decent fetish place, some you'll get in Ann Summers, some that's so crap I hardly know anywhere that'd sell it.
(The good ones were mostly at Fetish Expo at the Barbican a month or 2 ago.)
Toys and stuff: again, any decent shop etc. would find it. Lots of good gear and some cheap - from S&M toys, whips, etc., to electrical, to restraints, several good specialist leatherware/leatherwear places, a vinyl specialist, a plastic specialist, some metalworkers. Good selection.
(Lots from Fetish Expo and the like. If you go to fetish shops, sex shops and goth shops, there's nothing you wouldn't find. Some would be tricky, though. Try Fettered Pleasures (Caledonian Rd.) - who had a stand - Regulation, places like that.)
Porn: lots of videos but all very mainstream. Lots of bukkake, anal stuff, gangbangs, housewives, all the usual. Nothing outré or interesting.
(Any of the better Soho shops have more range. Guided tour available on request.)
Stage show: some good gear, good fetish fashion in various modes: armour, metal, latex, etc.
(The one at the Rubber Ball, a month ago at PoNaNa, was better.)
Lingerie etc.: this is stuff I'm less familiar with. Some lovely designer stuff, streets ahead of Anne Summers, and one or two stands with some really good gear. Impressed.
Weird clothes: a couple of fun gothy stands and so on, but nothing you wouldn't find at Cyberdog and Camden market and maybe Whitby gothfest.
One funky leathers stand had some amazing gear. Nothing you could wear in public, but real Flash Gordon stuff. Cool!
More normal leathers: well, that was funny.
I have a "duster" coat. Cost me £160 at last year's NEC bike show. Saw the same in softer leather at Fetish Expo, £600. Found it again at Erotica: £800. Want a guide to bargains? You know who to ask. I was chuffed to see one of the bigger better biker companies, Biker's Gearbox, had a stand, selling some of the same sort of stuff as the "specialists" for a tenth of the price. Excellent.
A couple of stands selling lube, polish (the sort of stuff Noel calls Perv-O-Shine) and so on. Quite good - better range/prices than I've seen in the UK. We bought some. Cheaper than Skin2's stand, and faster & better service.
I did like the DildoDolls: cuddly 1' tall willies, in fur coats, tartan, leathers, all sorts. Great fun. Too expensive to buy for a laugh, though.
The author of the authoritative guide to all the massage parlours of the UK was a little overbearing and offputting, and I don't go to such places. I'm impressed by his knowledge and his personal keenness to sell his book. I'd like to think he was dressing up and acting the part of a scary dirty old man, but I don't think so. Suffice to say K ran away.
Now, if the guy that wrote my guidebook to the best strip pubs of the South East was there, I'd have snapped up a new edition in an instant and got his autograph.
In other news...
Saw DougS there. He recommended the stage show. We weren't so impressed, to be honest.
Let's put it this way.
I've been to dozens of Gothic events, festivals, fetish fayres, shops and clubs this year alone. I've been to the Whitby Gothic Weekend, the Rubber Ball, Club Wicked, Fetish Expo, just about every TG and most of the Slimelights... I've repeatedly toured Camden Town and House of Harlot and Soho and the like... and then there was Paddles, Religious Sex and other places in New York.
I blame Norway. And Mr. "Latexiron".
I saw very little that was new or interesting and felt we were a little ripped off for >£10 a ticket. Also, there were some saddoes and lager lads and so on cluttering up the place.
If you don't know the shops, the places, the clubs, the websites, and don't do this sort of thing normally, and you enjoy the weirder/wilder side of sex, stuff that involves some special toys/clothes/places etc.,
you'd think it was *amazing.*
It was a laugh. There was more to see and do than this year's NEC bike show and that cost me a lot more.
There's another one in Manchester in March. If you don't get out as much as I do and live in the desolate frozen North, go for it.
Now, it's almost mainstream - and popular and well-attended. Plus ça change.
So Kjersti & I decided it was time we went.
It was kinda fun. Not sure it was really worth the money, though.
Some very odd stands... some kind of Sodastream gadget, a home sauna company, a car sales stand...
Lots of pervy/fetish stuff.
An arts section, ranging from excellent to crap.
Some great fun furniture stands. Clothing ranging from good to shite - some you'd find at any decent fetish place, some you'll get in Ann Summers, some that's so crap I hardly know anywhere that'd sell it.
(The good ones were mostly at Fetish Expo at the Barbican a month or 2 ago.)
Toys and stuff: again, any decent shop etc. would find it. Lots of good gear and some cheap - from S&M toys, whips, etc., to electrical, to restraints, several good specialist leatherware/leatherwear places, a vinyl specialist, a plastic specialist, some metalworkers. Good selection.
(Lots from Fetish Expo and the like. If you go to fetish shops, sex shops and goth shops, there's nothing you wouldn't find. Some would be tricky, though. Try Fettered Pleasures (Caledonian Rd.) - who had a stand - Regulation, places like that.)
Porn: lots of videos but all very mainstream. Lots of bukkake, anal stuff, gangbangs, housewives, all the usual. Nothing outré or interesting.
(Any of the better Soho shops have more range. Guided tour available on request.)
Stage show: some good gear, good fetish fashion in various modes: armour, metal, latex, etc.
(The one at the Rubber Ball, a month ago at PoNaNa, was better.)
Lingerie etc.: this is stuff I'm less familiar with. Some lovely designer stuff, streets ahead of Anne Summers, and one or two stands with some really good gear. Impressed.
Weird clothes: a couple of fun gothy stands and so on, but nothing you wouldn't find at Cyberdog and Camden market and maybe Whitby gothfest.
One funky leathers stand had some amazing gear. Nothing you could wear in public, but real Flash Gordon stuff. Cool!
More normal leathers: well, that was funny.
I have a "duster" coat. Cost me £160 at last year's NEC bike show. Saw the same in softer leather at Fetish Expo, £600. Found it again at Erotica: £800. Want a guide to bargains? You know who to ask.
A couple of stands selling lube, polish (the sort of stuff Noel calls Perv-O-Shine) and so on. Quite good - better range/prices than I've seen in the UK. We bought some. Cheaper than Skin2's stand, and faster & better service.
I did like the DildoDolls: cuddly 1' tall willies, in fur coats, tartan, leathers, all sorts. Great fun. Too expensive to buy for a laugh, though.
The author of the authoritative guide to all the massage parlours of the UK was a little overbearing and offputting, and I don't go to such places. I'm impressed by his knowledge and his personal keenness to sell his book. I'd like to think he was dressing up and acting the part of a scary dirty old man, but I don't think so. Suffice to say K ran away.
Now, if the guy that wrote my guidebook to the best strip pubs of the South East was there, I'd have snapped up a new edition in an instant and got his autograph.
In other news...
Saw DougS there. He recommended the stage show. We weren't so impressed, to be honest.
Let's put it this way.
I've been to dozens of Gothic events, festivals, fetish fayres, shops and clubs this year alone. I've been to the Whitby Gothic Weekend, the Rubber Ball, Club Wicked, Fetish Expo, just about every TG and most of the Slimelights... I've repeatedly toured Camden Town and House of Harlot and Soho and the like... and then there was Paddles, Religious Sex and other places in New York.
I blame Norway. And Mr. "Latexiron".
I saw very little that was new or interesting and felt we were a little ripped off for >£10 a ticket. Also, there were some saddoes and lager lads and so on cluttering up the place.
If you don't know the shops, the places, the clubs, the websites, and don't do this sort of thing normally, and you enjoy the weirder/wilder side of sex, stuff that involves some special toys/clothes/places etc.,
you'd think it was *amazing.*
It was a laugh. There was more to see and do than this year's NEC bike show and that cost me a lot more.
There's another one in Manchester in March. If you don't get out as much as I do and live in the desolate frozen North, go for it.
