Vendors & Artisans
Discover the makers, merchants, and creative minds joining us this year. From kink essentials to handcrafted goods and local artistry, there's something for everyone.
Weekend Vendors
Lakeshore Maille
Lakeshore Maille makes a variety of handmade chainmaille creations, ring by ring, for a wide range of audiences and lifestyles. These creations include: wearables such as necklaces, bracelets, hair clips, earrings, dice bags for gaming, coin purses, decorative suncatchers, fidget toys, and whimsical creatures like dragons, bats, and cats.
Lakeshore Maille's "After Dark" collection includes everything our perverted little minds can come up with for bedroom or dungeon fun, including: collars, nipple clamps, collars, body harnesses, and scale-mail wear.
Our favorite specialty is working with you to design meaningful customized versions of these chainmaille creations in your favorite colors.
Twilight Ember Kinkery
Twilight Ember Kinkery is a small Midwest business where every item is carefully, kinkily, designed and made by hand. Straight (but not that straight) from our dungeon workspace, we offer a full line of luxurious restraints, fetishwear/accessories, and bed play systems in a variety of vegan-friendly, washable materials like rubber, PVC, nylon, velvet, and “bamboo silk”.
We choose these materials because they are low-maintenance, great for messy play or travel to parties and dungeons, and they offer alternatives to leather and latex… and in our community, nothing is better than having choices!
TEK founder Lady Ember designs each piece with accessibility in mind. With features for comfort, side-release buckles for accessibility, and multiple sizes, Twilight Ember designs are also perfect for players of all sizes and flexibility levels, switch couples, and folks just wanting to explore new things!
Sparkelly
Our signature items are our Owie Pops—available in a wide variety of shapes and sizes. They’re glittery, vibrant, and create beautifully crisp marks on the skin. Each one is crafted from resin epoxy, carbon fiber rods, and wooden handles. All of our Owie Pops come with a lifetime guarantee, and we will happily replace any that ever break.
Exquisite Implements
We provide creatively designed wood paddles, canes, and other sensory-inducing devices. Lovingly designed and shaped in St. Louis, MO.
We're just two kinky, silly geese making cool stuff out of wood in our garage. We were first inspired to make items for our own toy bags, but things got out of hand, and now we have a scrappy little woodshop and a small, kinky business!
We make everything we sell ourselves and use mostly salvaged and off-cut hard and exotic wood we find. We believe in reusing and recycling all we can -- even finding use for our smallest off-cuts. We feel creativity and adaptability in kink is essential, and we try to bring that same mindset to each piece of wood we shape. No two items are exactly the same, and we let each unique piece of wood dictate that.
We only sell locally right now and vend at local kink events and markets whenever we can. We currently do not have an online store or inventory, but we try our best to update our socials with photos when we can. We can also arrange a meetup in the St. Louis area if someone wants to purchase/commission something.
SmacksAndWax
SmacksAndWax showcases a blend of high-quality materials, hand-selected and handcrafted into beautiful smackables, wax, and sensory play, because there are more sensations to experience than just pain. We're often known for transforming flaws and premium materials into beautiful, unique features that make each piece yours. Each piece, even within each design, is slightly nuanced so you can find the one that fits best in your hand. If something doesn’t feel good in your hand, then you won’t use it. Some of our proprietary designs come from happy accidents we’ve had while making orders or patching flaws. We are constantly innovating, so please check out what’s new. We care about being affordable and accessible, and offering products you can use in more than one way, giving you more bang for your buck.
Our low-temp wax is 100% pure paraffin spa-grade, so it’s meant to be on your skin and offers easy cleanup with a controlled drip. We are MSDS-compliant for soy and nut allergies between the paraffin and dye. All of this combined makes our candles great for most skin types.
We are a women-owned, LGBT+ couple owned by MissKyleigh and Raque, working out of our own home. Your support helps us chase our dreams, so we appreciate your patronage.
Ms Elizabeth
Ms Elizabeth provides a wide selection of handmade, steel-boned corsets for both MEN AND WOMEN, made from lamb’s leather and brocade fabrics, as well as leather kilts and accessories. She has been enjoying lacing people up for 15+ years. One of her greatest joys is seeing people beam with pleasure when they see themselves in one of her high-quality, affordable corsets. Corsets bring people joy, define curves, and help instill a sexy confidence in those who wear them.
EsKinkCollection
As a purveyor of pain for 10+ years, EsFortiva has fallen in love with a variety of implements that make his sadist's heart sing. That love eventually led him to experiment, make, and thoroughly test his own versions.
EsKinkCollection.com grew out of further experiments that led EsFortiva to tap into his woodworking background to make paddles, canes, fine cigar ashtrays, kink furniture, and a variety of torture devices. You can find something for any budget. Paddles are made using everything from common pine to exotic hardwoods. The EsKinkCollection lineup now includes leather and vegan floggers with fine, hand-turned wooden handles. All wood is finished with an incredibly durable, plant-based hard wax product that has 0% volatile organic compounds and is certified food-contact safe. The finish holds up well to repeated cleaning using products like Lysol and Cavicide wipes.
EsWhipShop.com (EsWhipShop on Fet) is excited to offer a selection of ready-made paracord whips, and we take custom orders. All whips have a core with copper-coated steel BBs, one or two fully plaited bellies, high-tensile bonded nylon cord to bolster the handle or transition, and a hot-wax treatment to protect them and improve performance.
Sir_Wieland
A variety of unique floggers, Paddles, slappers, bunny bats, harnesses, ropes, and many other handcrafted items to fill your toy bag.
Dungeon Store
We carry a wide variety of products, with a special emphasis on Violet Wands and other electro-fetish items. But we also deal in a wide variety of leather, wood, and vegan impact items across a full spectrum of price points for the discerning shopper. Internally, we often say that education is our fetish, so we happily carry BDSM nonfiction books on as many topics as we can lay our hands on, even the more rare ones! As our passion for education has grown, so has our line of books. We are happy to say we now vend a curated selection of modern occult books on a variety of practices and pantheons, along with tarot and oracle decks.
Thready or Knot
Thready or Knot creates handcrafted, functional gear storage designed for the beautifully chaotic world of kink. Based in Minnesota, we specialize in durable, thoughtfully designed toy rolls, convertible gear bags, and modular storage systems that keep your favorite toys organized, protected, and ready for whatever comes next.
Inspired by my own experiences as a kinkster and educator, my designs grew from a love of sewing, creative problem-solving, and finding better ways to organize and carry the gear I use. Each piece combines versatility, durability, and a little ingenuity, with plenty of room to make it your own. Whether you're packing a few favorites for the night or hauling your entire collection across the country, my gear is made to work as hard as you play.
Your gear. Your way. Control the Chaos.
Sharp Pointed Things
We didn't follow the genre. We created it.
Sharp Pointed Things invented the sharp-and-pointy category of kink toys—original designs from twisted minds, built for sensation play you won't find anywhere else.
DUNGEON-IN-A-BAG
Meet Dungeon in a Bag—where craftsmanship meets clever design. Built from rich oak or cherry wood, this isn’t just a St. Andrew’s cross—it’s a shape-shifting piece of furniture with a secret (Transformer)
With a quick transformation, it breaks down from the St. Andrew’s cross into a functional table, bench, or chair, blending seamlessly into everyday life. No dedicated dungeon? No problem. When you’re done, it all packs neatly into a sleek rolling golf bag—discreet, portable, and designed to go wherever you do. For an extra layer of stealth, it’s cleverly disguised in a classic black golf bag, hiding in plain sight with understated style.
Perfect for those who value both privacy and versatility—whether you're short on space, sharing your home, or constantly on the move. Dungeon in a Bag lets you keep things hidden… until you’re ready to reveal it.
Chicago Bound
Chicago Bound offers a diverse range of impact implements with a unique twist on upcycling. Handcrafted leather goods, including cuffs and collars, will be available. Additionally, you’ll find a selection of paddles featuring fun designs created using lasers and sublimation printing.
The Book Nook
RogueGinger and AislingStorm will be selling new and used books and bookish merch with a kinky twist
Local Services
Royal Plaits Hair Braiding Services
Braided hairstyles ranging from elegant, romantic designs to bold, fantasy-inspired looks with colorful extensions and accessories. I enjoy helping clients express their personalities and feel confident, whether they are attending festivals, themed events, conventions, or special occasions.
Brittney Politte Tattoos
Licensed Female Tattoo Artist
InkStains, Bootblack
Ink is a St. Louis native and Leatherperson with over a decade of experience crafting and caring for leather and leather adjacent materials.
Metal Priestess, Tattoo Artist
Licensed Female Tattoo Artist
Community Table
Rule 134
Rule 134 is a St. Louis–based photography studio specializing in portraiture, alternative editorial photography, and unconventional creative expression.
Founded by photographer Fenix, Rule 134 embraces the unusual, the experimental, and the unexpected. From expressive portraits to bold, imaginative concepts, the focus is on creating distinctive photography that goes beyond the ordinary.
Making its public debut at Exploration into Kink 2026, Rule 134 will be showcasing a selection of its work. Stop by the Community Table, check out the photography, meet Fenix, and say hello!
Please note: Photography sessions will not be offered during the event.
Body paint by: @neuropath.voids
QuadsofSteel
Middle-aged cyclist by day, butyl-rubber crafter by night. QuadsofSteel transforms discarded bicycle innertubes into vegan-friendly floggers, cuffs, leashes, and beautifully braided rubber that looks like leather but hits greener. Handmade for rubber lovers, kinky vegans, and those who love the planet. Keeping rubber out of landfills and putting it into very enthusiastic hands. Reduce, reuse, re-spank!
Bozz Built
Maker of Aluminum, Firehose and Wooden Paddles. Foam Bats
ShieldMadenSTL
An eclectic mix of beads, glass, jewelry, and sea-glass mosaic, with a few surprises! Come see a beaded spider sitting next to a snarky coaster for your fall tea!