Fetish
Factory's Halloween Fetish Ball 2005
or "How Fetish Factory saved Halloween in South Florida"
Every
year, people come from all over for what is one of the biggest and most
highly-anticipated parties in all of the fetish world, Fetish
Factory's annual Halloween Fetish Ball, now
celebrating ten years in fetish! One of the most memorable nights in Fetish
for South Florida's thriving scene, the ball is known for a crazy crowd,
great performers, and a chance for newbies to test the water with their
first fetish party.
What made this year so different from it's predecessors was not the party, but the non-stop problems and convoluted storyline leading up to this heavily-anticipated night. The event was originally scheduled for Saturday, October 29th at Revolution in downtown Fort Lauderdale. As the promotion began to gain momentum and take off, a shadow of doubt was cast on the fate of the party as Hurricane Wilma began to track towards South Florida.
Hurricane
Wilma made landfall in South Florida on Monday, October 24th as a category
3 hurricane. The damage from this storm was so widespread that even a
week later, the power was still not back on in downtown Ft. Lauderdale
or pretty much anywhere else in South Florida. Homes were destroyed, jobs
were either lost or on hold, and tempers began to boil over as the weather
changed from cool and refreshing back to a more usual hot, balmy bog.
People were displaced; more interested in sitting in hours-long lines
to buy a gallon of gas and a bag of ice rather than picking out a costume
for a holiday that had lost its relevance in the wake of a disaster. Halloween
seemed like it had just passed by in South Florida. No pumpkins, no parties,
no fun to be had by any of us still in the dark and worried about the
immediate future.
Fetish
Factory went into panic mode fearing the loss of their biggest sales week
of the entire year and the office transformed into a veritable warzone.
The store was damaged, the signs completely destroyed, and the store was
full of Halloween inventory and decorations that had already been all
but forsaken. No power, no internet connectivity, and worst of all, no
eager Halloween patrons. Fetish Factory co-owner and party pioneer Glenn
Catapano dropped some hard cash on a generator to have the store
open on Halloween, but for Fetish Factory's Halloween inventory, interest
seemed at an all-time low. Police-enforced curfews throughout South Florida
made any sort of nighttime social events a thing of the past, at least
for the time being. Frustrations mounted and tempers flared as the event
organizers scrambled to gain internet access in order to get word out
to their attendees about the postponment and rescheduling of the party.
Catapano got on the phone. The next venue seemed like a sure bet. The new date would be Saturday, November 12th. Two weeks after Halloween, but better late than never. As Fetish Factory remarked in their email bulletins defiant of the scourge that the hurricane had left on South Florida and the entire Halloween season, "SCREW WILMA! It ain't until we say it's over!" with urges to come out and keep Halloween alive.
Coliseum,
the home of two out of three of the Fetish Factory's epic 10 Year Anniversary
Fetish Weekend events was scheduled as the "new" official venue
of the Halloween Ball. Even though certain sections of the enormous club
had been damaged in the hurricane, they were deemed by the management
to be either repairable or simply be sectioned-off before the event.
As the timetable began to shrink, electricians examined the broken AC and noticed massive damage to the internal wiring of the club. On Thursday afternoon, November 10th, a mere two days before the party was set to go off, the management of Coliseum made a apologetic call to Catapano explaining the situation and making the difficult decision to close the doors until the problems could be properly corrected. This would mean that the party once again had been derailed.
Always
persistent, Catapano refused to call it quits. He got in touch with the
management at Club Cinema in nearby Pompano and secured
this new venue within the hour. Club Cinema not only able to accommodate
this popular event, but they were excited to do so. Once again, the news
went out to the partygoers that the venue had been changed not once, but
twice. The party was still scheduled for the same night, thankfully, with
all of the same great entertainers.
Word travelled quickly about the venue change. Fetish Factory told their friends, and they passed on the news. Through word of mouth, phone calls, online posting, and email-blasted newsletters, the community was informed in record time and the event was on full-speed once again.
Fetish Factory's store was slammed with costume shoppers in the days leading up to the event. The store and the party both seemed poised to turn around the poor fortune that the hurricane-plagued Halloween season had left on Fetish Factory.
The
event got an early start at Club Cinema as the doors opened at 9pm. At
10, the venue had a few hundred earlybirds, but the venue didn't get packed
until 11pm. At 1 in the morning, as people continued to pile in and stay,
the carvernous, high-ceiling venue almost felt cramped.
The MC for the night was Masuimi Max, the hottest fetish model in the world today. She debuted her new character, the legendary Vampira, a Coffin Case resurrection of a classic '50s character that actually predated the better-known Elvira character. Her hands-free headset mic allowed for plenty of shenanigans as the night went on.
Aerialist
Lindsay climbed to the ceiling and spun an aerial display that
dazzled the crowd. Rebecca and Rubberdoll
performed a reprise of their popular medical fetish show from the recent
Fetish Factory export
party in Tampa, but this time with a new kinky twist!
Regulars mingled with first-timers in this ecletic mix of beautifully dressed partygoers as the music pumped over the enormous house speakers. The dancefloor came alive and bounced in rhythm. As the night wore on, the place only seemed to become more energized, and thankfully, the management of the club decided to extend the party by another hour and keep the crowd in the house until 3am. When the lights came on, the place was still full.
Overall,
the party had an attendance in excess of 1,100. Fetish
Factory thanks all of it's fetish friends for supporting this incredible
event and for not giving up on Halloween even when the odds are stacked
in favor of the disaster. It seemed like the crowd took this celebration
as an end to the misery and tragedy that Hurricane Wilma had put us all
through and we were ready to cut loose, have fun, and get everything back
to normal. Halloween was saved!
http://www.FetishFactory.com
http://www.TheFetishParty.com
http://www.FetishFactory.com/Halloween