A Moment in London

LONDON DAYS

In the mid-90s, I happened to have some business in London, and accidentally attended an avant-garde fashion fair. There, I had an unforgettable experience. Walking around an aisle, I suddenly saw a young woman, standing in the middle of the aisle with her arms raised, being "polished" by someone with a cloth. I had never seen anything like this before, and the iconic image was planted in my brain forever: Her black latex dress was elegant and simple, skintight and shiny. It was tailored by Ectomorph and is now a classic. The designer Krystina Kitsis showed me a copy of Skin Two, which was a modest black and white 24 pages at the time. Soon after, she introduced me to Tim Woodward, with whom I agreed to produce a sort of "German edition" of his magazine. Skin Two and the London scene of the time took the fetish theme to a whole new level. Photographers such as Grace Lau, Bob Carlos Clarke and Trevor Watson impressed with a classy, black-and-white look that made the latex fashion on display all the more erotic. Until then, I only knew the relevant magazines such as Gum, Club Caprice, Sir, etc., which were only available in sex shops at the time. There was no internet, no other sources. "Skin Two German Edition" appeared seven times. Right from the start, I opted for a coloured cover and a special portrait format for the first issue (the latter later turned out to be an own goal when it came to distribution). There was little to report on the inside, there was no fetish scene in Germany at the time, only a few clandestine circles. Among other things, we presented a lot from the Ectomorph label. I was still quite unexperienced at the time, made mistakes and messed with Tim and Krystina. But the main reason for switching to <O> was that I wanted to publish in German and English, which of course, the contract with Skin Two didn't allow. But I was also concerned with the content. For me, the fetish theme was fun, colourful and sexy, while in my opinion, Skin Two remained more SM-heavy and gave the “fancy designers” less space. In the years that followed, and especially in the early days of MARQUIS, we became competitors, which was also reflected in some editorial tips. Tony Mitchell, who was then working for SK2, once wrote that in MARQUIS, "the models who wouldn't have made it in Skin Two always showed up in Marquis" ... Well, drumming is part of the craft Skin Two clearly deserves the credit of being the pioneers. Tim and Tony introduced the theme of fetish with style and class. Without our meeting in London, there would probably have been neither <O> nor MARQUIS. In the later years, we met here and there, eventually had some drinks in Las Vegas and buried all animosity. Tony even worked for MARQUIS for a long time - his "Fetisch Gossip" column is unforgotten.

Peter Czernich, Solingen in February 2025