Leathers

My Photos & Travels

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Events & Such	Travels & Such	Other Stuff
Dore Alley Erotic Art Weekend Folsom Halloween IML Pride SDiego Comic Con	Back East DC Trip The Pentagon Planes and Stuff The Whole Bay San Diego Fire '03 LA Trip Xmas 2007 Yosemite 2010 Zion	Arimondi Gone Goat Leathers Long Ago My Projects Richard Chatterton Kilts! Septoplasty! Gallbladder!

Leathers

Me and my leathers. Me in my leathers. I've been at this for quite a few years now. Quite a few.

This picture of me here on the left is from when I was last up at a Folsom Street Festival. This one being back in 2018.

I think it's about as "leathery" as I can get. Dehner motor patrol boots, leather jodhpurs, leather uniform style shirt, Sam Browne belt, police belt, leather gauntlet gloves and a nice big Heartwood flogger hanging from that police belt. And it's at a Folsom. Hard to be more "leather" than that!

It's taken me a number of years to work up to all of this and I've had no few adventures during those years. Decades, actually.

I've had a number of different leather outfits over those years. Some of which are long, long ago since worn out. Or aged to the point they became unwearable - mold will tend to do that leathers - or are simply so damn small I couldn't now squeeze into them to save my life!

But this page will serve to be a run through of my leather attire. I've put it together as I keep getting asked "got any pics?" by guys on sites which limit the number of images you can upload onto their "app."

Just as a contrast to the image above, it being the latest one I have of me in full regalia, is this first picture of me in any sort of leather setting.

It's from back in 1986. Yes, 1986.

I was all of twenty four years old in this image and it was at one of my very first SM "educational" events - a night at a meeting of the "People Exchanging Power" group in Washington, DC.

A long, long time ago in a galaxy far, far away...

	NLA-SD Holiday Party 1991 This was a fun time! I'd been in San Diego but little more than a year and was having a fine time of it. Among other things I'd found the local National Leather Association group and jumped right in! They held a "Holiday Party" in 1991 at "Wolf's" leather bar there at 30th and Upas.
	The thought it'd be great to have a "living centerpiece and asked for volunteers! Once again, my hand shot up and I was "it."
	I had fun with this. Ere I to do this again it won't be with that much cold sour cream slathered on me for a couple of hours. I actually got truly chilled from that!

It was fun though and I think it all looked great!

The early 90s were a good time for me leather-wise. I was solidly connecting with some great leatherfolk in San Diego, in Orange County, and up in Los Angeles as well.

I'd also a lover, Kim, and introduced her to the leather / SM / fetish world. She took to it fully. And for several years we had a blast together within it.

She took this photo of me here on the right at the LA Pride Festival in 1993. That's her collar around my throat. I was quite happy with the arrangement.

For a good chunk of the 90s I was heavily involved in the National Leather Association - San Diego Chapter. I was on its board when we took the group independent of the NLA and created Club X San Diego.

I was also heavily involved with the kink / leather convention the NLA-SD and Club X held each year: LeatherFest San Diego. I met a huge number of excellent people through my involvement with all that effort and it was quite fulfilling.

31st Birthday Abduction Party

This was lots of fun and it was one of the reasons Kim and I worked so well as a couple.

I was always clear with her that I was bi and all of my gay friends got along quite well with her. For my 31st birthday she set up a "surprise" party for me in which I was "abducted" out of Wolf's and "spirited away to an unknown locale."

There, my friends had their way with me. It was a great gift from Kim.

My involvement with the leather world didn't lessen through the rest of the 90s. But, for some reason, I didn't have as much photos from those years. This, being pre-digital.

In the summer of 2000 Sharon and I were dating and decided to do an outdoor photo shoot of us in our hides and such. A friend of hers had a great place for it in a canyon with some privacy.

I was back up at Folsom in 2000 and enjoying myself.

I volunteered for a stint and the National Coalition for Sexual Freedom booth there at the Festival. The NCSF had been of great and timely assistance in helping Club X beat the whole San Diego 6 thing so returning the favor with some of my time seemed right.

But I did have time left over during that day and enjoyed myself out and amongst the crowd there at Folsom.

Lots of fun indeed!

2001 was also a good year.

I hit up IML for the first time in several years. It was a lot of fun to have come back there with that much more experience under my belt. My hair at that time was in its full glory and I enjoyed having such a mane.

I had a lot of fun with the guys I'd come to know over the years who'd also made "the pilgrimage" to IML.

I took in yet another Tom of Finland Erotic Art Weekend in 2001. This was when it was at an art gallery on Santa Monica and the energy was great there!

And I was up at Folsom again where I discovered the photographer Mark Chester and his gallery there on Folsom itself.

I was back at IML in 2002. I just didn't get any pics just of myself that year.

I was back at Folsom, of course. The first order of business that year was getting myself a new pair of combat boots. These turned out to be Corcorans - THE combat boots! Yay me!

That night I was over at the Loading Dock for the Hootboots.com boot party and got 'em shined for the very first time! I asked one of the other boot guys there if he'd take my picture getting my boots shined. He did. And did so as the boot fetishist he was by focusing the picture solely on the boots and not me and the boots!

Ride, She Said...

At Folsom's end I joined my hosts for an excellent dinner at a nearby Thai place. It was a great way to wind down the event and the weekend.

Among the friends there sharing the table with Richard & Marie was another friend of theirs, Traci.

She looked absolutely dynamite in her leathers that day. And she was wearing these killer boots to set the whole outfit off. Well, turned out the boots were also "killer" on her feet and once off of them during the dinner her feet then let her know that walking in those boots was out of the question. Even just the few blocks back to Richard's place there on Folsom.

Well, I did what any other gentleman would've done in helping such a distressed damsel!

IML 2003

A lot had changed since I first started going there in the 90s. And I'd changed too.

Oddly enough, at IML in '02 I met the woman I'd eventually move out from Oklahoma to live with me in San Diego. It was a passionate affair indeed. And we "kicked it off" in '02 by my finding an unused room at the Congress Theater, pushing her into it, and making her howl with her legs wrapped around my head.

Putting more of it all together.

On the left is the first time I was out and about with Richard Chatterton's leather kilt. I inherited it from him and it's something I prize. The man is still missed.

I'm also wearing the leather bondage corset that Marie had made for me. She had it worked up by MacLeo's Sexy Leathers in San Diego. She specified the three D-rings on each side as it made for an excellent way to keep a big guy like me securely bound. At the Portland Leather Alliance KinkFest in '02 she proved just how effective those rings were.

I'm also wearing this leather arm sleeve on my right arm. It's a neat custom piece that I picked up at IML in '02. You can see it better in the image below.

I brought Julia up to Folsom in 2003, her first time there, and we had a blast together. I even brought her 'round Mark Chester's for some good leather photos for us that year. Mark was not and is not keen on dealing with women. He's just one of those gay guys who doesn't even like touching females. Oh well, his loss. Good photos though.

Folsom 2003 with Julia at Mark Chester's

In 2006 I attended the San Diego Pride Festival and decided I'd rather be comfortable in the July heat of America's Finest City™ than be seating it in full hides.

So, I got myself a Leather Pride Flag sarong and headed out. I was comfortable indeed! And nothing like "going commando" on a hot summer's day in such an otherwise lightweight bit of attire.

I know I was more comfortable in it than Gayle there in her leathers. Though, Gayle certainly looked hot in other ways!

The next year I was up at the Southern California Leatherwoman Contest as it was held in the El Segundo Masonic Lodge. It was a fun and very much "community" event. Far more so than the usual leather title contests.

Among other things, they had a community fund raising auction where the contestants provided items to be sold in it. As one particular contestant was from San Diego and as I was from San Diego, the producer asked me to display the goods!

Well, shucks, if I must...

So, again in Richard's kilt along with my Dehners was I there. This time up on stage holding a pan of Chocolate chip cookies! No, I wasn't being auctioned, the cookies were! It was a great event and I'm glad I got to attend it as well as help out - even if just standing there holding some baked goods in the process!

In 2008 I was living the life of a "road warrior" - that is, working as a consultant at various locations out of state. That particular year it was out at Huntsville, Alabama.

The pay was outstanding and I'd damn little else to do but work and head back to the hotel room at day's end. That, and do the twice monthly travel as per the contract I was on. This was "flight back home or equivalent airfare to any other destination." So, that meant I started hitting up other events and stuff!

And I knew I'd need some new leathers for that! So, I hit up this one vendor I found out in Atlanta and got myself my very own pair of custom made jodhpurs. Just the thing to go with my Dehners.

After a wee bit of back 'n forth with the leather maker, I was in fine form with this piece. As part of the alterations she'd inserted a swath of Lycra down along the calves. Aside from being stretchy and allowing them to fit me better, that Lycra was also slick enough to allow the boots to slide right off with minimal pulling! She's now adopted that with each new pair of jodhpurs she makes.

Mark Chester liked them as well.

2009 was quite the year for me. My work had now shifted to El Segundo and I'd picked things up with Ann, who I'd met the previous year at the South West Leather Conference. That was a very "woo woo" event. But, she was there in all her ponyplay glory and we connected quite well.

Ponyplay was new to me. And it was no small rush doing it at Folsom where she always drew a crowd. It was very ego stroking.

Even Mark had to admit the photos he took of us were among his most commented to date!

Not a whole lot new over the next couple of years, leatherwise. Did a nice set in 2015 at Mark's again. That year Ann and I did some of the best images we'd had done with Mark. We had lots of great leather adventures together over the years.

Up here in Los Angeles now, I've been able to attend a lot more of the Tom of Finland Foundation events.

On the left was taken at the 2015 LA premier of the Tom of Finland movie. It was a nicely done film and it was great to be able to be there to take it in.

On the right was back in early 2020 at the "book premiere" of Peter Berlin's new book. This was held at the Tom of Finland Foundation House there in Silverlake.

I was one of the few guys there in leather that night. Kinda striking, that, for an event at the ToF Foundation for a guy who was an icon of the gay leather community for so few people to be there in their leathers.

Tom's Bar June 2022 Best Leathers Contest

By the summer of '22 things have slowly started opening back up here in California. One example thereof was the Tom's Bar which took place in June.

That was fun. As it was the first Tom's Bar in quite a while they really pulled out all the stops. And as it was no longer subject to the Covidiocy restrictions I made sure to get out and attend.

As it was a Tom's Bar put on by the Tom of Finland Foundation, I figured it'd be just the event to be all leathered up. So, leathered up I was!

The Muir Cap is something I'd picked up custom made from Off Ramp Leathers out in Palm Springs in 2020. It completes the whole "BLUF" (Breeches and Leather Uniform Fanclub) look nicely. The tie included. I got that back in '19 when 665 still had their shop running in WeHo. It's a full tie, not a clip on.

Yeah, I was all leathered up and sweating on that warm summer's day. So, as soon as the "Best Leathers" contest was over it was out to my car in the nextdoor parking lot and ditching the leather shirt and such!

Oscar took this image here of me n stage at the contest. I didn't win but it was fun to do.

In the fall of '22 the Tom of Finland Foundation held another of their "Art & Culture" weekends and I spent some quality time there in Daniell's chair. She's a highly skilled bootblack who also knows how to work up her customers.

At year's end the Tom of Finland Foundation held a "Holiday Party" and among the guests was Santa himself.

I made it a point of sitting in Santa's lap that year and what I asked for will remain between he and I.

The annual "Off Sunset" festival took place in March of '23 and I made sure to be a part of it. It was a nice warm SoCal spring day and I was wearing my new leather shorts along with my newly purchased "Nasty Feet" engineer boots.

Those boots turned out to be painfully too small for me. So small, in fact, that they cost me the toenail on my left foot's big toe! Ouch! They were listed as size 12 so either they run small or my feet have grown. In any event, I'll not make that mistake again!

Chaps and Chainmail

As I've been getting myself into better and better shape I've become more comfortable wearing outfits I've had hanging in my closet unworn for years now. These chaps here on the left are but one example of that.

The chainmail shirt never hung unworn in my closet as the thing was too heavy. Instead, it remained unworn on the floor of my closet.

Until October when I would this outfit at Palm Springs Leather Pride weekend. I like the look of it all and so too did a number of other folk.

I needed a good pic of it so I took matters into my own hands when I was in San Diego for a Ren Faire and wore it out to the Eagle that night.

More to come as I get more photos of my leathers and get more leathers as well!

If you would like to know more about this adventure I had, then just ask! Click on my email address here:
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This page was last updated on: 09 November 2023

Unless otherwise noted, all photographs and images on this page are copyright protected property of Madoc Pope. If you would like to use any of my images you must contact me first before you do so.

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In the meantime, I hope you have enjoyed your "stay" at this site. Check back again to see what new images I have added. Until then, stay well, play hard, play safe, and have fun!

Madoc