Kink.com to Recruit at Folsom Street Fair

SAN FRANCISCO - Iconic BDSM website and studio Kink.com will perform rigging demonstrations and recruit new talent at the 25th annual Folsom Street Fair Sept. 28. The annual fair celebrates the BDSM lifestyle and sexual diversity.

Kink.com directors Van Darkholme, Isis Love, Princess Donna and Lochai, expert rigger Lew Rubens and adult performers LaCherry Spice, Natassia Dream, Wolf Hudson and Nick Moretti will man the company's booth at the fair.

In addition, Darkholme will be recruiting new talent for his site Bound Gods, which focuses on the BDSM spectrum in the gay community.

"This is a really important chance for us to meet up with some new models," Darkholme said. "The leather community is full of hot, kinky guys who are curious about appearing on camera, but haven't made that step yet. This gives them a chance to get to know us and for us to make contact with them."

Lochai, the recently hired director of Hogtied, and Lew Rubens, Kink.com's bondage consultant, will perform demos at the fair. Both men are among the best-known bondage riggers in the BDSM community, and are sought-after educators.

Transsexual performers Spice and Dream will represent TS domination site TS Seduction, meeting and greeting throughout the day, posing for pictures and recruiting male bottoms and transsexual female tops for the site.

"Natassia and LaCherry really want to meet their fans; that's really important to them," said TS Seduction director Love. "This gives the fans an opportunity to meet two of the world's most gorgeous transwomen looking totally fine in latex. We'll be doing recruitment both for TS tops and male bottoms. We love having new talent at TS Seduction, and this lets us get out there in the community and find the super-hot trannies and the guys-next-door who really want to know what the site is all about."

A prolific performer as well as a director, Love also will sign autographs and pose for photos, and she admitted she's likely to do spontaneous demos.

"Sure, I'll probably spank some people," she said.

Wired Pussy director and frequent performer Princess Donna will be at the booth promoting her new public sex and bondage site Public Disgrace, which is scheduled to launch Oct. 1, just a few days after the fair. In addition to greeting fans, she plans to perform a demonstration of the kind of public bondage and punishment viewers of her new site can expect.

"Public Disgrace features hardcore, explicit sex, which we won't be doing at the Folsom booth," she said. "But we'll still have plenty of fun."

Kink.com founder and chief executive officer Peter Acworth said the fair is as eagerly anticipated among the leather and BDSM communities as any major mainstream holiday is anticipated by more sedate types.

"Folsom Street Fair is the No. 1 holiday of the San Francisco fetish community, so we look forward to it every year," he said. "This will be a chance for Kink.com to get out there, meet our fans and let everybody see what we're like in person."

The Folsom Street Fair began in the early 1980s as a predominantly gay male street fair. Folsom Street has been the center of San Francisco's gay leather culture since the 1960s. Now in its 25th year, the fair attracts approximately 400,000 visitors of all genders and orientations from all over the world. The proceeds of the fair - more than $300,000 in 2006 - are donated to qualified local charities.

Folsom Street-affiliated events now also occur in Berlin, Toronto and New York City.

This year's fair is scheduled for 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Folsom Street between 7th and 12th streets.