Published in the Vancouver Sun

No photo credit. Just as well, since the editor (Michael Scott) chose the absolute worst, unflattering photo he could have picked. I offered alternatives, but he had made his mind up based on the first photo he could find that didn't have nipples or someone flipping the bird in it, and refused to consider the better, equally tame, photos. Should I have expected more from the paper that likened me to a pill-bug? Probably not. Nonetheless, it is a published photo in the city's flagship newspaper and I'll take that feather (which I can't help imagining as being coloured yellow) and stick it in my cap all the same.

Fancy a night of ‘fetish play stations’ and racy kilts? Welcome to Sin City

The Fetish Sextravaganza is for people who love to lower the barriers … if only for a night

BY JOANNE BLAIN

VANCOUVER SUN

SEXUALITY | Be prepared to see anything from bare-chested guys in kilts to girls in vinyl nuns’ habits at Sin City’s Fetish Sextravaganza tonight at Richard’s on Richards.

The one thing you might not expect is for event organizer Isaac Terpstra — otherwise known as DJ Pandemonium — to be dishing the dirt on the event over a cellphone from Ikea.

But that’s the thing about fetishes — even people who shop at Ikea can indulge in them.

"The barriers are completely gone," says Terpstra about Sin City’s regular monthly fetish nights. "We have 19-year-olds, 29-year-olds, 39-year-olds, 49-yearolds — it’s not an atmosphere where if you’re not 22 and hot, you feel excluded.

"You might get a husband and wife who have snuck out the back door and left their kids with a babysitter, but you also get people who are alternative by nature and this is a good representation of how they dress in real life — they might not even have to change."

Terpstra and business partner Aaron Harrison (a.k.a. Mr. Dark) have been watching their once-a month fetish nights at Club 23 West sell out for the past three years. "There are literally more people in line before we open our doors than the club can even hold," says Terpstra.

So they decided the time was ripe to stage a big annual blowout, like the ones held in fetish-friendly San Francisco and Los Angeles. That the event happens to fall on Sin City’s fifth anniversary on the Vancouver fetish scene is a happy coincidence.

At a club almost twice as big as their regular venue, the Fetish Sextravaganza will feature everything from DJs and burlesque performances to photo and video installations and "fetish play stations" — although Terpstra is quick to point out that it’s all good, clean fun.

"You can only go so far, of course, because it’s a public environment," he says. "We do want people to be able to express themselves in an adult manner, but only if it’s positive, healthy and legal."

Be forewarned that there’s a strict dress code — no "plain jeans, cargo pants, briefs or boxers, T-shirts and suits," according to promotional material for the event, but "fantasy or period costume, armour, cross-dress, rubber, bondage, body paint [or] fancy lingerie" are just peachy.

Terpstra says those rules are designed to keep out complete voyeurs and to make sure "people who come to the party are part of the party. You can’t just show up and enjoy everyone else’s costume — you have to provide them something to check out as well."