21st Century Kinkycrafts review

Those of you who are familiar with do-it-yourself publishing and California-style skill sharing will recognize this book’s lo-fi layout, illustration and typography as holdovers from its first incarnation as a spiral-bound collection out of Janet Hardy’s kitchen. (Yes, that’s the same Janet Hardy who gave us The Ethical Slut.) She draws on the expertise of “perverted handypeople and handy perverted people all over the world,” including BDSM education stalwarts like Jay Wiseman, in putting together this collection of toys and accessories that range widely in the price of materials and tools, the effort and talent required, and the kinkiness level of the resulting product.

In fact, the book is remarkably uneven, which may be the downside of its homespun charm. Some of the ideas in this book–like “The Tongue Condom,” which explains how to turn a latex glove into a dental dam–are more basic sex ed than kinky crafts of the 21st century. Some of the ideas are intimidating and depend on you already having some serious tools, like jigsaw, anvils, files, sawhorses, along with the expertise to use them. In this sense, it’s a little intimidating. The ‘recipe’ for the “Motion Detector Vibrator” calls for the splicing of wires–yikes!

However, there’s plenty to work with in here for beginners. My partner and I have had great results with the various floggers and paddles Hardy includes in the book. They make great toys and great gifts for your kinky friends. For those of you who love leather, making these with your partner(s) can be a lot of fun, and with a little practice you can make ouchy hitty things just as awesome as the ones you buy and much, much cheaper. Personal tip: sometimes your local leather store will have scraps they can give you for free or almost free, it’s always worth asking.

For me, the book was a little bit of a let down, probably because I was actually looking for more of a specific leather-crafting how-to, but all in all this is a good resource with something for everyone. Another personal tip: watch out for the “Inner Tube Whip”–it’s evil! This is the kind of book that would be good to check out from the library, if libraries were more inclined to carry books like it--that is, not only kinky but self-published to boot.