Melbourne has had one of its coldest, driest, cloudiest
winters on record. Petrol prices keep rising and impinging
upon our wallets and purses. The insanity in the Middle
East and elsewhere in the world is mercilessly thrust upon
our senses by the media. Interest rates will probably have
risen by the time you read this.
All this gloom and doom can easily depress
us, and the lack of sunshine to brighten our health and
our daily lives can leave us feeling really down. Melbourne
has the least sunshine of all Australian capital cities.
The Melbourne Leather Festival commences
on 1 September, the first day of Spring. New life! New birth!
Nature awakens! Let’s Celebrate!!!
Let us get with Nature, awaken our dormant
sexual senses, and use the Festival to Spring into Leather!
OK, it’s corny, but it is a call to arms. Reinvigorate
yourself, because if you don’t know one else will
do it for you.
This year, use the Festival to explore
something new. With 30 events to chose from, there’s
really no excuse for slumbering on in your comfort zone.
‘Leather’ is, of course, a traditional umbrella
term which embraces the wearing of leather, latex, PVC,
uniforms, and other associated fetishes. There is also the
play side of our sexuality expressed in Bondage, Discipline,
Sado-Masochism and related erotic Fun.
30 events in this, the 11th year of
the Festival. Wow! I never thought it would grow to or stay
this big when I saw its first tentative steps back in 1995.
Look inside for the amazingly varied
program. There are events for men and women; gays, straights
and bi’s; singles, couples and groups. You can gain
knowledge and skills at the five seminars and workshops;.
You can shop till you stop. You can dance your feet off.
You can tie one another up in knots and whip the, er, out
of your partner – or yourself – using new or
familiar techniques and implements. You can wine and dine.
You can soak up art, and relax at the movies.
For the first time we have a really
strong program for women. There are also heaps of choices
for those who like a mixed setting. While the men’s
events are fewer than usual, the quality is there with the
last weekend of the Festival seeing a male cluster. The
program reflects the willingness of groups, organisations
and individuals to accept our invitation to do things for
themselves and the wider community. It empowers people to
act, but it doesn’t compel them – everyone decides
to opt in or out for themselves, to be part of the Big Picture
of our Community or not.
We welcome into the Melbourne Leather
Festival for the first time –Roze Elizabeth, LEVEL
ONE men’s cruising club, Wet on Wellington, D.Vice,
Leather Dykes, Master Joe and Chains members, and Slit Dyke
sex magazine,. We welcome back from previous years –
ABODE, Metropolitan Community Church, Mistress Cleo, Eagle
Leather, Marquis de Sade, Kink-E magazine, VicBears, Perversity
and Beyond.
I especially thank all those whose voluntary
efforts together create the Melbourne Leather Festival.
There are no paid staff and we get no government funding.
The Festival costs are shared among the organisers of the
Festival events and our supporting advertisers.
Now it’s up to you to support
the people behind the events and ads by perusing the program
and attending some events. If every reader of this program
went to one event for him/herself, one for a partner and
one for the country, they would all be booked out. To ensure
the Festival continues next year, we need you and you need
us! Add at least one new event to your diary this year as
you explore and enjoy all that adult eroticism in the fetish
field has to offer.
I hope to see you at some of the events
I will be attending. Look out for me and say “G’day!”
