Fashion and "BDSM"

The intersection of fashion and what people perceive as "bondage" or "BDSM" has long intrigued me. Even back when I was in high school, I can remember some of my teachers showing us picture spreads and advertisements in fashion magazines, and pointing to anything that looked vaguely rope-like coming off of a woman's clothes and claiming that it "represented" a leash, and therefore the subjugation of all women. I had enough reasons not to like those teachers, but the way they went on about that stuff really ticked me off.

Kink, like other practices considered outside of "mainstream" society, has a real problem with people misusing its terminology. Too often I hear someone talk about a "bondage dress," and then I see that it just has a couple of horizontal straps on it that only have a decorative function. I was reminded of that earlier this week when I saw a news article talk about fashion models in "BDSM-style denim masks" that just looked like dreadie wigs put on backwards. If those can be called "BDSM-style" then I don't know what isn't "BDSM-style."

There are, of course, those fashion designers who use elements of actual bondage in their designs, such as this Samuel Cimansck show that showcased some very interesting -- and more importantly, effective -- gags. I got one of the first copies of the complete reprint of John Willie's Bizarre magazine when it came out from Taschen about twenty years ago, and one of the ways Willie liked to talk about bondage in the couched terms he had to use back then was to wrap it up in the auspices of fashion. I can still remember a wonderful article he wrote in his tenth issue -- gorgeously illustrated with his watercolors and line drawings, and even one photo of a tape gagged damsel -- about how gags would eventually become a fashion necessity for all women.

I've always believed in the value of aesthetics in kink -- such as matching a duct tape gag to the wearer's clothes -- but it's hard to see true bondage in fashion becoming much of a reality simply because of the worries about the wrong people seeing it. There's.a part of me that still wishes that John Willie's dreams about gags becoming fashionable would come true, though, and not just because I can think of a lot of people who need to be gagged all the time. Those old high school teachers of mine certainly spring to mind.