BACKGROUND

Where did we get that love of girdles? If you were of age in the golden age, that was simply what ladies, and even girls wore. You will have seen, and had hands on experience. For the lucky amongst you, it may well have been your first experience. If imprinting is correct, your love of girdles is easy to explain.

I, alas, was not and did not, missing it by perhaps ten years. Girdles were still being worn, but they were in retreat, inexorably up the age range. Lingerie manufacturers did not give up without a fight though, and my formative years - the early to mid 70s - were filled with images of wondrous and ladylike garments, while at the same time snatching from me any possibility of ever experiencing their delights directly. It was a strange feeling, that only served to intensify the desire. Imprinting clearly works on a number of levels.

I saw beautiful, elegant and sexy images in mail order catalogues and magazine adverts. All those sleek and well fed ladies, delightfully girdled, and often with a voyeuristic touch. The feeling of spying on the lady in her bed chamber, or while she prepared for an evening out. Other times it was as if she had seen you, eyes on you straight out of the page with a haughty, but knowing look. A tribute to skill of the photographers and ad men of course, but that part of the psyche responsible for desire overrode what the conscious mind knew. These adverts were aimed at girdle buying ladies, but we girdle lovers liked to believe they were aimed at us (individually in the days before the internet when we all lived largely in isolation). But alas, fewer and fewer of the potential girdle buying young ladies were becoming actual girdle buying young ladies.

And that, for a quarter of a century, was that. Girdles were the great non-subject, the thing that many millions of girdle lovers (and it certainly must have been millions) could never mention and had to keep to themselves.

But along with the internet, for me, as I'm sure for so many others, the gateway to realising that I was not alone, other technologies were advancing. Digital cameras, and associated memory, colour printers and CD writers. All were improving, and more importantly, getting cheaper. A thought occurred, would it be possible to hire a model and take some girdle pictures of my own? To recreate some of those long lost images. The thought occurred long before the realisation of course, long before. Admiring those exquisite girdle images I had often wondered what it would be like to be close to a lady in a girdle, camera in hand, ignoring all the manifest difficulties of developing the film (which is what rendered it impractical, no way would I have taken film to be developed. The cost of equipping myself was prohibitive, and I had nowhere that would have made a suitable darkroom).

October 2000, I procured a digital camera and was impressed by the quality of it's output and by its battery life. My thoughts turned to girdles. Why not? I had a camera and the means - a CD writer - to save as many images as I am ever likely to take. All I needed was a model.

As it turned out, finding one was remarkably easy (although there was, I think, a significant element of luck). Practical photography magazine (I've only ever picked up about three photographic magazines in my life) has an extensive collection of adverts in the back, mainly for things not required by the digital photographer, but there were, of course, models. Not that many, and as most of the small ads included the word "glamour", I was not particularly hopeful (as a complete novice, I had all sorts of imaginings about the consequences of first time nerves. No need to go into too much detail!)

One ad did catch my eye. I recognised the name and associated postage stamp sized photo. The lady had, I knew, modelled girdles in the past, appearing in the very ads that had first stirred my interest. Naturally enough there was a phone number on the ad, and fortunately a postal address as well. I would not have relished making an initial contact by phone and wrote to her asking for an appointment (maybe it's just me, but it is so much easier in writing). Her studio was only about 40 miles from where I lived.

She did not reply immediately, but she did reply. Then it was that I called her and heard her voice for the first time. She was pleasant and friendly, which from a professional is only to be expected, but I was to find that the friendliness was genuine and she is an absolute delight to work with.

I explained that I was a complete novice which did not seem to bother her, a good sign (I wasn't going to even try to pretend to be anything else!) Our initial words were the arrangements for the shoot, the date and time. Then I mentioned girdles and said I would very much like to photograph her in one. I asked her if she had any in her extensive wardrobe (knowing that it was not very likely). She said no and in a very matter of fact way mentioned that she had modelled them in the past (which I, of course, knew). Then I asked if she would mind if I brought a couple along. Again, in a very matter of fact way, she said it would be fine (I, of course, was in a highly nervous state and was doing my best to sound nonchalant. To her, it was just somebody making a booking). She gave me directions to her studio, said she was looking forward to seeing me and then bade me farewell.

The die had been cast and it had all been so easy. The shoot was still more than a month away, and when I returned to the favoured pastime of trawling the net for girdles, I was now doing so with some purpose. I was now looking to get a few for a real woman to wear! She had told me her size (waist and dress size) and I was to discover just how much variation there is in the sizing of ladies apparel (I'm afraid to say that in those images where the girdles fit really well, it's just the luck of the draw!)

I met the lady at her studio, after so many years of my fevered imagining (never imagining that we would actually meet). Fortunately, it was one of those moments. I had visions of haughtiness, and disdainful treatment (the image of models as vain prima donnas does not, I suspect, do justice to the majority of hard working professional models. I wonder why they are always portrayed so), but these visions disappeared in an instant. As I said earlier, her friendliness was absolutely genuine and she knew exactly how to put me at ease.

After a bit of informal chat (we both recognised that it was expected, and it was quite pleasant as well) we got down to business. I showed her the girdles which she examined with interest. She mentioned again that she had modelled them before, but said that she had never been asked to pose in one by a private client. To my surprise (something that struck me later, on my way home in fact) I found that I was discussing the girdles matter of factly as she was. It was the last reaction I expected!

As the shoot progressed, I began to feel something akin to elation. I was not making a fool of myself. She was not laughing, nor was she bored or disdainful. I was beginning to feel like a real pro. But that was what I felt, not what I was!

A couple of things became immediately apparent in the aftermath, when the results were reviewed, elementary to a proper photographer of course: the importance of good lighting and the lack of a tripod. The camera's own flash is not much use indoors really (it can take a proper flash, but I've never bothered getting one). Most of the images from this first shoot are too dark, and none of them are usable here.

For the second and subsequent shoots, I had a tripod, which not only makes framing the shots a lot easier, but provides the steady platform that does not upset the cameras own delicate autofocus and light settings. I was also to find that it was often better to have the cameras own flash turned off and the scene well illuminated, although in auto mode, there were occasionally yellowish or reddish blooms apparent on some of the shots (noticeable, but not enough to be objectionable. Photoshop could get rid of them fairly easily).

I did try a few shots with manual setting of the shutter, aperture etc and the results were far better, but it did slow things down a bit. Given the choice between quality and quantity, I chose quantity (as Lenin once remarked, quantity has a quality all of it's own). Quality can always be bolted on later (the ubiquitous photoshop again).

It did not take long to become completely at ease, and the shoots (I do them approximately every three months) became something to really look forward to, a release, a pleasurable oasis among the myriad small (and not so small) niggles of everyday life. Many were the times, at work dealing with some cretinous individual, or stuck in traffic, or contemplating some expensive purchase, that my mind would wander. I would be reliving a shoot, or, far more pleasurably, anticipating the next. Thinking about poses, angles, and of course, girdles! Once in a while, a real gem would turn up, and the gods of size would ensure a perfect fit.

So there it is. As a hobby, it really takes some beating. Effective therapy for a damn sight less than a shrink. And, if you are feeling generous, you can share this therapy with others. I commend it most earnestly!