Paul Stag
One of Germany’s premier fetish clubs the LFCD is about to celebrate its 25th anniversary with its first major circuit party 3-day event weekend over 20-22nd May. It is an exciting time for kinksters in the beautiful Saxony city on the banks of the River Elbe as its leading fetish bar Bunker the club’s natural regular meeting place is celebrating its 30th birthday anniversary the same weekend. We spoke to Martin Hey one of the 5 club committee members to find out what is planned.
Martin said ‘The Leather Club Dresden is a non-commercial association offering a place where gay men can meet in Saxony. It has got its own location where our members and their guests act out their feelings of wearing the fetish they like the most. Our location, the “Bunker – Das Original!”, has much space for all kinds of gatherings of gay men. You can play out your fantasies there. Some special events take place on Saturdays and Sundays, see Events. We like wearing our special fetish gear on those occasions. Newcomers are warmly invited to come to see us on Fridays. This day is always free of any dress code.’
DRESDEN FETISH TIMELINE
In 1991 a group of guys with fetish (especially leather) interests started running a bar in a real bunker in the basement of a building in Dresden. That’s how the name of the bar BUNKER was born and a legendary venue came into being.
Five years later, in 1996, a club was founded to support AIDS prevention within the group of leather guys and ensure the continuation of the bar BUNKER as a safe space for gay people with leather interests to meet, cruise and play. To their great credit the club members run the bar as volunteers without getting any money besides their full-time day jobs.
The members of the club meet about five times a year to do events such as a boat trip, hiking, bowling or something similar. The main part of their work is to run the bar as a meeting point not only for club members, but also for fetish people from Dresden, it’s surrounding area and overseas visitors to ensure a safe place for enjoying their gear. In addition, the club is a major part of Dresden Pride and twice a year they organize HIV and STI testing for the community.
In spring 2019 they renamed the club from “Lederclub Dresden” (leather club Dresden) to “Leder- und Fetischclub Dresden” (leather- and fetish-club Dresden), due to the ongoing diversification of the fetish scene with rubber, pups, sports, bears, skinheads, uniforms etc and the fetish parties were broadened in BUNKER bar from “classic fetish parties” to appeal to all and especially for younger fetish guys and guys that are just curious and have only have limited gear or budgets. The bar is open always on Friday and Saturday’s and some other nights.
In fall 2019 the club joined LFC (https://www.lfc-online.de), which is the umbrella association of German speaking fetish clubs. This was an important step to better work together with other fetish clubs within Europe.
MAY 2022 – they celebrate the club and the bars anniversaries jointly. The future plan is to hopefully hold a big event like this one possibly every second year.
THE ANNIVERSARY WEEKEND
See full extended programme on the event website.
FRIDAY 20th MAY
Starts at 8pm with welcome drinks in the BUNKER and 2 hours later the main party begins with the opening of the play spaces and DJ entertainment until the early hours.
SATURDAY 21st MAY
Begins at 11am with the fetish tour of the city on a double decker bus.Then there is the Meet & Greet dinner at the ARTEUM venue to welcome the special guests together with a look back on 30 years of BUNKER and 25 years of LFC Dresden plus a toast.
The highlight of the weekend will be the Birthday Fetish Party starting at 9 pm at the Arteum Club. You can expect a unique location with a dance floor, bar, lounge, outdoor area and a dark room. The theme is: ‘Show your Fetish’. and the guidance says ‘It’s up to you: leather / rubber / uniform / Army / Workwear / Neoprene / Skinhead / Sportswear / Petplay / chav… be creative, be diverse, and most of all: wear something you feel SEXY in!’.
The Arteum is in a basement and has four barrel vault rooms which makes it a really cool location for such an event. One room will be the dance area, one room will be a dark room with slings and a cruising area, one room will be the lounge where you can talk, relax and drink a beer or so and one room will be the changing room. Of course, there will be a bar. In addition, they have a special surprise act just before midnight. The BUNKER bar remains closed this evening so all can attend the big party.
SUNDAY 22nd MAY
For the early risers starts with a fetish brunch at 11AM at the Restaurant Rosengarten enjoying a stunning view of the Elbe river and the city. followed later that day by a 5-hour relaxed drinking and socialising gathering at the BUNKER.
DRESDEN’s EXTENDED GAY SCENE
Besides BUNKER there are two other gay bars, a gay café, another gay cruising bar and a gay sauna. Now and then, there are gay disco events in random clubs. It is definitely an up-and-coming gay fetish destination. It also shows how all it takes is a handful of keen organised passionate kinksters in any town or city to come together to form a group with great regular events and build up a local interactive friendly gay community supported by any of our many queer/fetish associations that are easy and welcoming to join and can massively help you or them with publicity.
