New York Part II: Shops and Leather Pride weekend

Posted by Tanos on Sat 16 Jul 05, 11:52 PM

A couple of weeks ago I wrote a first weblog post about lili and I going to New York, and seeing Gloria Brame's talk at Paddles. This second post is about the BDSM / Fetish shops we managed to track down, with some short reviews and pictures; and also a bit about the Leather Pride Night, and Folsom Street East fair.

The shops we visited divide into two areas. First Christopher Street in Greenwich Village, and secondly Chelsea near 20th street. Both districts are on the West side of Manhatten. For finding shops, the BDSM Store Vendors page on www.domsubfriends.com and Peter Boots guide to New York were invaluable.

So first we got the subway to Sheridan Square in the heart of Greenwich Village. This is still a prominently gay area of the city, and was the scene of the Stonewall Riots in 1969.

Coming out of the subway at the start of the western stretch of Christoper Street, "New York Fetish" is a couple of doors west of the subway steps (which you can just see on the left of the picture, and it's Sheridan Square which is reflected in the window.) I'm getting this one out of the way, since the staff did seem to have a "follow you round the whole shop" attitude and we weren't very impressed. Despite this, they have a lots of leather jeans, jackets and some BDSM gear, plus some lovely embroidered corsets and a small amount of womens latex and PVC fetish wear.

Much better was "The Leather Man" at 111 Christopher Street. This was small and friendly, and takes up just one of shop front widths that seem to be standard in the older parts of New York. Again mostly clothes, but this time with more BDSM gear, especially down the spiral stairs in the cellar.

Finally for Greenwich Village, "London" is in the basement of 84 Christopher Street and reminded me most of the Rob shops, especially the one in central London in the UK which is about the same size. As well as clothes plus leather cuffs, floggers etc, "London" had some decent metal restraints, of the type you'd find at Fetters, Mr. S or Rob itself to a lesser extent.

The other group of shops we went to are in the Chelsea district, north of the Greenwich Village area. Starting at 135 West 22nd Street (between 5th and 6th Avenues) with the New York branch of "DeMask". Based in the Netherlands, DeMask is one of the world's most famous fetish fashion labels, and the spacious ground floor has fetish art pictures and a selection of the DeMask latex range. SM gear and some medical devices and heavier rubber items like full body suits are in the basement. (This is one of the few fetish stores that, like Stormy Leather in San Francisco, doesn't feel like it's been crammed full to bursting point.)

Next "Noose" is at 261 West 19th Street (between 7th and 8th Avenues) and is another narrow shop like "The Leatherman". Although it's largely aimed at men, they do sell latex, including London labels like Invincible and some lovely corsets (including one designed for Madonna, apparently.)

Finally, "Purple Passon" at 211 West 20th Street (between 7th and 8th Avenues.) The shop is much bigger than you'd think from the photo, since it's really two storefronts wide as it spreads out behind lobby to the left, and has a basement with discounted items. (They had additional discounts of 20-50% on all items in honour of Leather Pride Weekend.) They have a very wide range of books and magazines near the entrance, and the rest of the space is divided up into latex, leather, corsets, toys and bondage gear. The store had the biggest mix of items of the shops we went to, and was definitely the largest. If you were only going to visit one store, then we think Purple Passion should be it.

As well as the shops, we also went to the "Leather Pride Night" auction at the Roxy, and the "Folsom Street East" fair. The auction was really a charity fundraising social event, and was mostly run by the gay and lesbian SM groups in the region. It finished at 10pm and was followed by various after parties at play venues around the city like Paddles.

This year saw the 9th "Folsom Street East", with part of 28th Street closed for the length of a city block - the name comes from the leather street fair in San Francisco's Folsom Street. Again it was really a social event (unlike the Skin Two Expo, for instance, which you can enjoy by just going round the stalls all day) and was smaller than the monthly BBB in the UK.

In fact, one of the things that did strike us was how much more comprehensive the London BDSM / fetish shops are. Apart from there just being more of them in London than in New York (or Chicago or San Francisco), they tend to have more stuff and better quality at that. It's also striking that the city doesn't have a serious bondage-orientated store like Fetters, Fettered Pleasures or Mr. S in San Francisco.

Edited Thu 31 Aug 06, 9:18 AM by Tanos