Midnight Manor, an alternative lifestyle community based in Greater Sudbury, is hosting their second annual BDSM convention Saturday Sept. 10, attracting crowds of kinksters from all walks of life to the Northbury Hotel and Conference Centre on Brady Street.

Midnight at Dawn, the 18+ event, returned after a hiatus because of the pandemic.

To ensure a pleasurable experience for all, Midnight Manor functions on the motto of safe, sane and consensual.

“That's what communication is about–being able to express what you want because we all want to feel good," organizer, Paul Nadeau, has said in the past.

Organizer, Paul Nadeau, explained it is important for the space to be open and inviting so people want to spend time and interact.

The vendor fair will run from 10 a.m. until 10 p.m. Vendors from all over Ontario setup with their wares; including Pure Romance, Hamilton’s Fabulously Fierce and northern author, M.J. Spickett and more, along side local vendors like Sam Poulin Design, Dick Napalm's Bunny Bound and Rooted In The North together with many others.

Midnight Manor has partnered with Réseau ACCESS Networks, a local HIV/AIDS and social service organization, to offer sexual health education by providing safer sex supplies and offering to connect people to sexual health testing as part of the vendor fair.

“We did this event about three years ago … and we are here for a second time; we had such a great time for the first event, we thought we would come back for the second,” Tammy, a representative from Fabulously Fierce, said.

Fabulously Fierce makes hand-crafted adult clothing in Hamilton, selling them on Facebook.

“We do a lot of waist training corsets, custom corsets, leather corsets, PVC corsets; we have dresses, we have a new dress line that just came out that is corset-based as well; as well as we do belts.” Denise, the owner of Fabulously Fierce, told CTV News.

This is the first time at the event for author, M.J. Spickett, from Espanola. She does a lot of events and trade shows while trying to keep per audience informed on her social media pages.

Spickett was primarily at the vendor fair to market her books, but also brought along other merchandise and swag to sell. Spickett has 4 on-going series, Raven’s Realm; an urban fantasy and general adult series, Woman of Ravenwood; a spin-off of her Raven’s Realm series is a more grown-up paranormal police drama with erotic elements, The Immortals; an erotic paranormal thriller and Gods Among Mortals; an historical fantasy series.

"(The Immortals) my brand series … this series I started last year and there is actually seven books in the series I have been writing non-stop,” Spickett told CTV News.

The other series were originally started over 20 years ago; however the books are currently getting a facelift, with new covers, new editors for a modern audience. The books can be purchased on Amazon.

Rooted In The North was started in Sudbury by Sarah and Mel. What started as a craft show idea has transformed into an alternative fashion brand. The company’s styles range from gamer to geek to goth and everything in between.

“We sell a lot of geek wear; we like to geek out. Mel is a big gamer. I like a lot of sci-fi and stuff and anime so we try to do it all.” Sarah said.

“Pillows, sweaters, shirts, mugs, headbands and basically whatever catches our fancy we try to design something to go with it.”

Additionally, the expo will host a series of seminars and workshops throughout the day, including; wax play, shibari, sexual communication and more.

The event will end with live stage shows starting at 10 p.m. featuring the talents of the Toronto Kinbaku Salon, who are also teaching the shibari workshop at the event and Sudbury Burlesque.

KJ from the Toronto Kinbaku Salon, Canada’s oldest rope school, told CTV that the stage show will include at 45-minute suspension show of Japanese style shibari. The Toronto Kinbaku Salon teachers rope 4 days a week with introductory classes on Fridays.

“(We) teach all levels of rope from absolute beginner to you can do a suspension performance like I am going to do tonight,” KJ explained.

“Rope is a medium for connection and emotional intimacy with another person and it very connecting an connective.”

KJ’s partner in the show, Lily, told CTV news, “It is a really good form of consensual play.”

Admission to the vendor fair is $10 at the door, additional ticket pricing for packages, workshops, seminars and the stage show are available on their website.

For more information on Midnight Manor or the expo, including a full list of vendors, visit their website (18+ plus). 

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