This document began as a set of "general guidelines" for the first-ever EhBC play party. EhBC is a kink-friendly social community in the wilds of Southwestern Ontario. In 1997, after several years of operation, they finally became brave enough to organize our first play-party. Because of the relative inexperience of a number of people in the EHBC community, they felt we might benefit from putting some simple guidelines in place for that first party. The guidelines were drawn from many sources and assumed at least a basic knowledge of BDSM practices, regardless of actual level of experience.
This information has been grouped into several categories, and for simplicity, it is assumed that most of these rules apply equally to both private play parties (which typically use their own brands of "house rules") and to public fetish nights. We would suggest that you try to learn the "house rules" of either a play party or a fetish night before you attend.
When some of the members of the EHBC community organized their first road trip into a Fetish Night at one of the Toronto bars, there was much ado about "what to wear". Since we have many people on budgets, or without access to specialty shops like Northbound Leather or the He & She Gallery, we needed to come up with suggestions for how to dress.
Some of these suggestions involve a modicum of construction talent, or patience; however, most of the ideas can be put together from easy-to-come-by materials. Farm supply and hardware stores are a cornucopia of "pervertibles". While black as a colour and leather as a material may be "de rigeur" fetish dress, there are as many alternatives as there are bodies to wear them.
(As a side note, it is typically a good idea to check the dress code for each fetish bar well in advance of your planned trip; the "severity" of the dress code varies noticeably from place to place).
When in doubt, basic black works every time - black jeans or skirt, black shirt, black shoes or boots. Simple or ornate is a matter of your personal preference. The more skin you can show, the better, especially for subs. Bear in mind that most public fetish nights or play parties have a "no exposed genitals" rule, which means you may need some sort of g-string to keep your privates covered.
Lingerie is easy to come by, often inexpensively. As a man, if you cross-dress, lingerie is usually the easiest option for fetish dressing - bras and panties, stockings, garters, corsets (including "merry widows"), slips and other items can be bought at any department store. Adult lingerie shops often stock a variety of more "daring" styles, but prices will rise accordingly, and sizes are often more limited.
Interesting or adaptable leather goods will often surface in second-hand shops, from boots and shoes to jackets, vests, hats, and so on. For those with some construction skill, these pre-made items can be cut down or re-modeled into anything you desire. Or you can start from scratch and build yourself a wardrobe or accessories from hides of leather if you are so inclined, and have the time, tools, and budget for working with leather. "Standard" leather clothing items include pants (or shorts), chaps, skirts, vests and hats.
Moving from the mundane into more "hard-core" fetish dressing, we come to items such as body harnesses, restraints, and "peekaboo" clothing.
Body harnesses run the gamut from rigid devices designed to take a lot of use and abuse, to decorative drapes of leather straps, or chains of varying grades (or combinations of both). Unless you have the wherewithal to design and create your own, these are typically only available from specialty shops, and can be quite pricey. Again, chain is readily available from hardware stores for minimal prices, and often requires nothing more than a saw and a pair of pliers to work into something fetishy.
Restraints are a very common item, and range from wrist/ankle cuffs to collars and leashes, and so on. These are often worn in conjunction with body harnesses, and may be joined to each other by straps or chains. Cuffs and collars are fairly easy to make if you are so inclined, and are also available from both adult novelty stores and from the specialty shops, often at relatively reasonable prices.
"Peekaboo" clothing refers to anything which covers the body without necessarily obscuring the view of it. This may involve anything from semi-transparent "mundane" clothing to lacy lingerie, bodysuits with zippers to reveal breasts or genitals, to sheer/transparent garments. Lacy lingerie is likely the easiest to come by, though zippered bodysuits are a staple at adult novelty stores (and can be easily made by a competent sewer). Clear plastic is often available through fabric stores for very low cost, and can be made (if your machine is up to the task, or if you don't mind hand-setting eyelets and grommets) into a variety of items, such as skirts.
For those with an interest in making rubber clothing, a lot can be done with inner tubes or sheet rubber (if you can get it). Fitting can be an arduous task when working with rubber, and your options for holding pieces together are rivets or glue (construction tip: if using glue on rubber or thick latex, find a way to score the surface of the rubber in order to give the glue more surface area to adhere to, and use clamps to hold the pieces together as they dry).
Some people also choose to wear a specifically evocative "costume" - a police or military uniform, a doctor's outfit, a schoolgirls' uniform, Victorian sleepwear, and so on. Second-hand and surplus shops are excellent places to hunt for items which might help "suggest" any of this sort of costume, thus saving you the expense of renting an outfit from a costume shop. Cities large enough to sport separate schools using uniforms will often have ads in local papers for uniform items which have been outgrown and are being sold off.
And finally, no outfit is complete without accessories. For many, this may simply involve wearing a crop or flogger from a belt loop, or dangling a set of cuffs somewhere accessible. This may involve "props" if you are wearing a costume - sunglasses and hats for those in uniform, knee-hi socks or teddy bears for little girls, and so on. A good pair of high heeled shoes or boots are a good addition for women and cross-dressing men; heavy boots, either western or Doc Martin-style, are common for men. Personally, I would rather see bare feet than loafers or sneakers and socks!
"Simple is better" in many cases - often it is far more effective to scale down the outfit to one or two accessories for two reasons: they won't make the outfit look "cluttered", and they won't get in the way if you decide you want to play at some point!