Denver, Colorado is the location of Mistress Saskia’s mile-high dungeon.

Beautiful and seductive, her talent for playful cruelty has made her the reigning Queen of Midwest kink, a name-brand dominatrix with a nationwide following of grateful submissives and avid fans.

What sets Mistress Saskia aside from the hordes of leather-clad, Hollywood-influenced dom-clones who bank on kink to pay their rent is Mistress Saskia’s wicked wit and her 12 years of experience in the BDSM scene. If you come to a session expecting a mindless “kitten with a whip,” you’ll be sorely disappointed: 41-year old Mistress Saskia is the thinking-person’s dominant, an intellectual sadist with a deceptively cheery grin.

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Do you have any advice for amateurs who want to start experimenting with power exchange play?

Books are a good way to start. I've recommended the A.N Roquelaire (Anne Rice) “Beauty” series in the past for beginners as a way of getting them to think about the difference between a hot fantasy and how those scenes would work in reality. She's good at getting into headspace of dominance and submission, but if anyone tried most of the physical things she describes, they'd end up with some pretty serious injuries!

To avoid those kinds of mistakes, I recommend books like Jay Wiseman's “BDSM 101” or “Screw the Roses, Send me the Thorns” for beginners. If getting involved in the local leather scene is an option, most leather clubs offer classes on a regular basis and hands-on experience is often offered.

I get a lot of mail from men who want their female partners to be more “dominating.” Do you have any advice for men who are eager to express their submissive sides?

I hear from a lot of men who complain that their wives and girlfriends won't cooperate with them and do the things that they want them to do, like dressing them up or spanking them or giving them orders.

I ask the men what they're doing to make the women's lives easier so they'll have energy to play, and every single one of them gives me a blank look. I ask if they're doing housework without being asked. Whether they have dinner on the table even once a week. Whether the towels that are in the linen closet are there because they did the laundry, folded it and put it away.

They invariably get a bit irritated with the line of questioning. When I explain to them that having to come home and do a second shift while a male partner is contributing to chores and household upkeep on a marginal basis doesn't leave a woman much energy to turn into Superdomme in the bedroom, they start to get an idea where I'm going with that. I suggest to them that if they want their partners to be more receptive to kinking things up, they look at the things they can do to help their partner have a little more energy and free time.

Sometimes they try it out and get good results. Sometimes it's too much effort to break habits in an established relationship.

Why do so many people fantasize about being submitting to a more powerful person? What’s sexy about that?

I think that the taboos we have in our culture against certain things are easier to rationalize away when there's the illusion that an authoritarian deviant is calling the shots. It's an emotionally safer way to explore things that people are curious about anyway.

Are there specific fetishes you enjoy more than others?

A fetish I enjoy more than other fetishes is the foot fetishist. I love being able to sit back and have someone adore my feet for awhile. I like having them massaged and petted and kissed and stroked. Ideally, I want a foot fetishist to be able to give me a decent pedicure. If I'm wearing heels, I like making people suck the heels (if I'm wearing spiked heels). If I'm wearing vinyl boots, I like having every inch of them licked. I like trampling the foot fetishists who are into being trampled and moan and make happy noises and happy faces while I'm stepping on them.

With BDSM, my favorite thing to do is to be able to read a person's body language, facial expression and vocal cues well enough to take them out to an edge, hold them teetering over it, and pull them back to safety. Getting them there feels like artistic expression and performance art and therapy and, oddly enough, a bit like a musical duet. It's not something I can do by myself, and the people I enjoy best are the ones who can let go of hesitations and inhibitions and go where I want to take them.

Can you talk a little about males who enjoy feminization, and some of the ways you transform grown men into a blushing virgins or a brazen sluts?

As a feminist, the most frustrating request I get from cross-dressers is “I want you to make me into a woman!” They don't want to be Ellen Degeneres or Madeleine Albright or Anais Nin or Gloria Steinem or the woman that does their taxes or waits on their table. They want to be Porno Barbie. Their feminine ideal is synonymous with vapid, nymphomaniacal passivity and submission. If I put makeup on them, they open their eyes as widely as possible, looking like a deer in the headlights, and flutter their eyelashes a lot. Their brain goes right out the window.

On the plus side, I love helping someone feel pretty, especially if it's for the first time and especially if they're not very attractive as males. On the down side, it's irksome that someone's idea of femininity is that shallow. Not every cross-dresser is like that, but the ones I'm the least eager to work with are. The ones I like the best are the ones who get makeup on for the first time, look in the mirror and smile a big, happy, genuine smile. The feedback I liked the best was the man who said, “I look like my sister! I never saw that before!” And then they notice lipstick on their teeth and try to lick it off.

Some women are uncomfortable admitting their submissive fantasies, because they’re worried their fantasies indicate a desire to be assaulted or are, simply, unfeminist. Can you comment on these fears? Can a woman be a strong feminist and also a true submissive?

Feminism and sex and kink are always on my mind, but more so in the past year because I've been told I'm not a feminist by some anti-porn and anti-kink feminists. I strongly identify as a feminist and don't feel that I'm any different in terms of kink identity to my switch or submissive sisters in the scene.

I can’t look at a woman who’s going after exactly what she wants and say she’s less of a feminist than I am, or anyone else.

What’s the hardest part of your job? What misconceptions about your work would you most like to correct?

The absolute worst are the guys who come in with bad attitudes and treat us like automatons who are there to entertain them and we'd better step to it or there'll be no shiny quarter for us at the end. Fuck. That.

The dominatrix-as-man-hater is a pretty common stereotype. The idea is that the only possible reason we could have a job like this is because we hate men. That we might choose to play with men for fun and profit because we just plain like to do that is less obvious to a lot of people.

In movies, the stereotype of the rich princess with a coterie of slaves is very nice, but the dirty, broke punk who doesn't take shit from anyone is a lot more appealing to me and is more consistent with some of the women I know in real life who do this work. Few of us get rich at it, but we're doing what we love and it shows.

What celebrities would you like to work with?

I have a thing for really brainy, talented actors. Off the top of my head, Amanda Plummer, Lily Taylor, Helen Mirren, Omid Djalili, Alfred Molina, Queen Latifah, Tim Roth, Lynn Redgrave, Danny Devito, Samuel L Jackson, Selma Hayek, Forrest Whitaker... they're all people I'd like to sit down with, find out what they consider kinky and go from there.

I got to work with Annie Sprinkle a couple of years ago and that was an experience I wouldn't trade for anything.

What do you want to be doing in ten years?

Writing more (I'm so lazy!), educating more, traveling more. I'd like to be able to teach CPR and First Aid to people in the kink community. I’d like to be a rigger, suspending people in rope bondage. And I'd like to have a really killer garden.

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To make an appointment with Mistress Saskia, summon your best company manners and click here:

www.MistressSaskia.com
www.PavloviaDenver.com
www.BrutalDommes.com

I enjoyed learning more about the things you like and your thoughts on these topics. Your views regarding the men not understanding the point in making the womans life easier are especially true from what I've seen in my 44 years in the lifestyle. I will hope to be able to meet you while I'm in Colorado.

Submissively, substriker

substriker

It seems you are focusing on satisfying your partner. Are you able to be satisfied yourself?

michelle