LA CONFIDENTIAL: The new appointment-only DeMask showroom located inside Isabella Sinclaire’s GwenMedia production facility at her Ivy Manor Studios in downtown Los Angeles
“We found with the Munich store that we had underestimated it and that we had a problem there. It took a lot of effort to solve it but now we’ve found the right team — a couple with a daughter who are devoted, really into the scene, very dedicated. We can see already that it’s working.”
Nevertheless, suggests Louva, it’s a bit too early to be talking about being satisfied with everything because one is always aiming higher.
“Personally I’m not after the money,” she says, “but I want to expand our business everywhere because I would really like to share what we do. I would really like everybody to know us — and not everybody knows us yet.”
‘I want to expand our business everywhere because I’d really like to share what we do. I would like everybody to know us, and not everybody does, yet’ – Louva
That’s an observation I can readily agree with. There’s a whole new generation of young fetish fans out there who won’t have been aware of DeMask in its heyday. These people are, surely, the ones the label needs to focus on reaching now.
“We took this new generation into consideration at the very beginning because we saw it immediately,” she agrees.
“Otherwise we wouldn’t have taken the step,” adds Anton. “If we didn’t believe there was a new generation, we wouldn’t have done it.”
“I strongly believe there’s a high demand on the fashion side,” he continues. “With all the examples in movies and video clips it’s definitely there, with all the young people who are attracted to it.”
You see it now with all the parties in Holland, he reckons — even those like B.I.T.C.H that are more like swingers’ parties. “Before we took over, that party did almost nothing for us in business. Now we have two parties one week after another and the shop is full.”
“They make us very happy,” beams Louva.
The Wasteland parties are also much better for business since the couple took over, says Anton. Proof, he believes, that four years of promoting the DeMask brand in Holland have paid off.
But it’s not just party people who are contributing to today’s increased turnover at DeMask.
“We also get a lot of young people who buy latex for themselves, to play at home. That’s something Steve thought had disappeared because it was an age thing from our generation.”
“These people are like 23, 24 years old,” says Louva, “and they have their own dungeon in the house!”
But while this new generation is clearly contributing to footfall in the DeMask Amsterdam store, what of the company’s web business?
One of the couple’s promises three years ago was that the practically prehistoric DeMask.com site would be replaced as a top priority.
And certainly, anyone who has visited the site in the last year will have noticed that the ancient animated dominatrix on the landing page has been consigned to the trashcan, and the inside pages now boast a much cleaner and more user-friendly design.
However, it transpires that what we see online today is but a halfway house.
“What we have now is actually a ‘new old’ website,” Louva explains. “The new one will be something completely different.”
Anton takes up the story. “When we took over we started with the ideas and how it would look, and in took us longer to develop
“We tried to do the design bit ourselves, but I underestimated how quickly the market changes online, how quickly the technicology changes. So by the time we launched it, it was already outdated.
“That was a very big learning curve for us. We’re now at the stage that we have a completely new design ready. It will look totally different, up to today’s standards.
‘It was a big learning curve. We’re now at the stage that we have a completely new website ready. It will look totally different, up to today’s standards’ – Anton
“We hired a graphic designer, Ayden Abdine, who’s also involved in the scene, and who knows very well how sites today should look, not only on computer but also tablet, laptop and mobile phone.
“Were now finalising the mobile version — the rest of the design is ready — so we’re busy now on implementing that.”
How soon will we see it? “It’s always difficult to say how long it will take,” says Anton with his customary cautiousness, “but I will say within the next year.”
“I would say the beginning of 2016,” counters Louva, ever the optimist.
To coincide with the relaunch of DeMask.com there will be a new corporate logo that will be seen across all the company’s branding, from stationery to the already redesigned EuroPerve.org website.
In fact, eagled-eyed partygoers might even have spotted it in October at EuroPerve IV, where a projection onto the stage backdrop showed the old logo morphing into the new.
Since we’ve strayed onto the subject of EuroPerve, I decide to ask Louva about the new latex collection just launched there. So, which comes first: the party theme or the theme of the collection?
“I always have a name for the theme of the party and I always do my collection from the theme,” she explains.
And what does she think about the potential saleability of these retro-inspired styles?
“So many people came to me last night and said ‘This dress, I want it!’. And I was really surprised ’cos I did this collection and thought, I really hope people will like it because I find it amazing myself.
“I took my inspiration from the ’60s, when they had a spacey mood, and because my thing this year was space, intergalactic, all that stuff. I really wanted to do something very special and I thought, wow I’m going to go back in time, and I did my own thing.”
I love the hats with the eyeholes, I tell her. What do you call them?
“Hats,” she replies. Serves me right for asking.
She goes on to explain that showing her collections at the party is also designed to give her a feeling for what people like.
“You see what the reactions are and from that you find out which articles are feasible and should be put in the collection to sell.
“We did the Louva TiTi Parisian Mini Dress some years
Louva has high hopes for EuroPerve Resurrection. She feels that the event is attracting the right people, and considers the substantial international element among this year’s crowd to be confirmation of things going in the right direction.
This makes her believe that the party will grow and grow as more and more people who already attend other strict dresscode events like London’s Rubber Cult are attracted by the ‘real fetish’ offering at EuroPerve.
I think there’s little doubt that the majority of Rubber Cultists would feel totally at home at EuroPerve Resurrection, and have no difficulty in finding other enjoyable things to do over a weekend in Amsterdam.
In the old days someone in London would probably even have hired a coach and organised an overnight ‘sleep when you’re dead’-style trip to the party. But is anyone enterprising enough to do that any more?
Returning to the retail side of things, up to this point we’ve been talking mainly about the Amsterdam retail operation.
But it turns out there have been a couple of brand new developments on the shop front suggesting that, after a period of contraction, DeMask is once again expanding its retail empire.
First comes the news that the label has teamed up with famous Los Angeles dominatrix, educator and GwenMedia owner Isabella Sinclaire to create an appointment-only DeMask Showroom inside the GwenMedia Production Studio in downtown LA.
Says Isabella: “GwenMedia and high-end latex fashion are synonymous, and I have had such a great working relationship with DeMask since the beginning.
“So it makes sense for me to bring their designs back to the United States and I feel honoured to be able to host their franchise at my studio.”
‘I have had such a great working relationship with DeMask since the beginning, so it makes sense for me to bring their designs back to the US’ – Isabella Sinclaire
Anton says the label is getting a lot of positive feedback from the arrangement, adding: “People are very happy to see us back in America.”
The second big retail news story concerns the opening of a DeMask ‘shop in shop’ at the massive new premises of German fetish emporium LGS close to the train station in Gelsenkirchen, near Essen.
“LGS is one of the oldest fetish companies,” Anton says, “and is also one of our oldest wholesale customers, very well known in Germany.
“Anyone who finds themselves nearby should definitely visit, because this is a shop where they have everything people who are into fetish or BDSM could ever desire.
“We already do very nice business with them, so we were very happy when they told us they wanted to increase the size of their DeMask stock and put it into a ‘shop in shop’ at their new store.”
I ask if there were any concerns about a potential detrimental effect on turnover at DeMask Dortmund, which is not that far away.
“No,” says Anton, “because we obviously spoke extensively with our people in Dortmund, and the the situation has always been that LGS was there, always as a wholesale customer of ours, before Dortmund started.
“Both parties said it is quite a big market and they both have their own clientèle so they don’t bite each other. Even better, they have a sort of co-operation, so if one needs something from the other, there’s a fairly good context to help each other.
“They said ‘We’re not working against each other, we’re working together’.”
Does DeMask have further expansion plans at this point?
“This is more me,” says Louva. “I’m the one who wants to expand, because I deal more with the outside world. For years since we took over, I’ve wanted to do something in Scandinavia. There’s a huge community in Norway, Sweden and Denmark and there’s nothing there for them.”
“So we’re looking at those expensive possibilities,” says Anton with a wry smile.
For the moment, though, there are no plans to establish a retail presence in the influential but highly competitive UK market. Not, I’m assured, because they wouldn’t like to have a DeMask UK outlet, but because a suitable partner for such a venture has yet to emerge.
“We need first to find the right people,” Anton says.
He goes on to point out that while the production arm of the business can cope with the amount of DeMask shops currently trading, they have to be careful not to create more demand than the business can satisfy while still meeting a four-week order turnaround.
For this reason, he says, they are currently “seriously busy with getting more staff in production”.
What about investing in advances in production technology? I well remember Steve English’s DeMask introducing innovations in production methods like die-cutting machines to stamp out latex patterns instead of manually cutting them.
The equivalent innovation today would be laser-cutting. Is this a direction the new DeMask is going in?
“Yes,” says Louva. “We are on it. It’s perfect, just perfect for what we want to do.”
“We already have several designs that use it,” says Anton. “But we have so many different articles that to put everything onto the new system is impossible. So we are building experience by having certain designs done by CAD (computer-aided design) equipment.”
Most of our conversation has been about latex because that is the primary interest of DeMask’s owners and the primary focus of the brand.
But the label has also always been known for leather, especially corsetry. And the news here is that Louva has found a source of “beautiful, colourful leather” available only in small batches, with which she plans to create a capsule collection of high-end corsetry.
Anton reminds me that a few years ago DeMask collaborated with buttock-loving fashion label Ishtar & Brute to create latex Booty Leggings. The Booty range, he reveals, is now being expanded and will include Booty Leggings made from stretch leather.
“Stretch leather’s gonna be a hit,” enthuses Louva. “It has been extremely difficult to find the source, because it’s used by the fashion industry and they never want to reveal their sources.
“But I found it, I did! I’m very proud of that!”
‘Stretch leather’s gonna be a hit. It was extremely difficult to find the source, as the fashion industry never want to reveal their sources. But I found it!’ – Louva
PERV EMPORIUM: Louva and chums at the new LGS Gelsenkirchen store with its DeMask shop in shop
Tags: Clothing, Designers, Heavy Rubber, Latex, Leather, Models
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