Last week was something of a week here at KC. We tried out the new event in London called London Below as well as helping out at the Welwyn Garden City and St Albans Christmas munch. One was quiet but interesting and one was interesting and anything but quiet.

London Below - 6th Dec 2015

London Below is a new market taking place at the Epic in Dalston, London. Right in the heart of the city.

Let’s get this out of the way, right now this is not a busy event. This was only its second time out after a bit of a gap. To add to its problems it fell on the same day as three other kinky markets taking place in London.

Talking to the organisers they knew about London Alternative Market (LAM) but didn’t know about the other two. But when dealing with venues you don’t always get the luxury of picking the perfect date. So it really wasn’t their choice to clash with any of these events, sometimes you have to roll with what you have.

Fantastic organisers

I only have the highest of praise for the organisers of the event (Tricia and Malc). Veterans of the kinky market scene in London they have the idea for a really fun and very different market. While there are teething troubles for sure I think there could be something beautiful in London Below.

Rather than aiming directly at the kinksters out there they are putting together an “Alternative” fair. So there is always going to be a diverse range of things to see, but much better in my opinion is that they are going to rotate some of the stalls that are allowed to be there.

Different every time

Meaning every time you go there is going to be something different and new. In my mind that is fantastic as it gives you a reason to go every month. The problem with it always being the same is once you have been you really have no reason to go again for a few months. Nothing will be different when you go back next month so why bother?

It is especially true of kinky markets, once you have bought the toys you are interested in there really isn’t going to be much point going back if it is always the same.

Deciding to change the stalls who are there every month is the right decision but also a brave choice. When you are getting established you want as many people to come to your event as possible (vendors and customers). So to actually turn away vendors who want to be there is a hard decision to make. They will pay you to come but you are actually saying no as a way of giving the customers a better experience.

Quiet, but we would do it again

Because of all the other things going on and it being a brand new event the whole thing was very quiet. But going into this we knew that was going to be the case. We knew one of the other events was on the same day but had no idea about the other two, combined with some road closures in London, that certainly affected the attendance.

But we didn’t go just to be in front of a ton of people. Diverse events like this are important and we were happy to be there to support them. From hopefully attracting more people to come (we have been promoting it for a few months) to giving the people who did make it something totally different to do.

Those who did do our workshop had an awesome time and that is something I hope they take back to their friends so they come again next time.

Make sure to check out their twitter feed to find out when they are going to be on next.

Please note: I don't have any images of the event, they were on the camera and it looks like I have formatted over them. Going to try and recover them.