By Solitaire

Solitaire judges Stripper of the Year award, having been twice nominated for it herself. She teaches at the London School of Striptease, as well as stripping in venues throughout London. Here she tells us about how she got into the industry - those of you who want your girlfriends and wives to learn, take notes!

I always wanted to be a stripper. It was my first ambition, age six. Twenty years on, via A Levels, a journalism degree and a successful career first in business then fashion journalism, I set out to achieve that aim.

I don’t know why, at an age when I couldn’t have understood what it really meant, I felt drawn to the profession. But some of my earliest memories are of watching James Bond films and Benny Hill shows with my dad and thinking that I wanted to be as beautiful, seductive and have as much power as those stunning women on the screen.

I was brought up in an environment where for a man to enjoy looking at an attractive woman wasn’t taboo. Dad would comment on mum’s hair or clothes, and they were openly affectionate. It wasn’t a household where everyone ran about naked, but I was never made to feel that my body was something to be ashamed of or ignored – something which has held me in good stead through teenage years and adult relationships.

Aged seven my friend and I decided to put on our first strip show. We got parents and siblings into my bedroom, climbed onto the ‘stage’ (my single bed), and started singing a ‘saucy’ tune and taking our T-shirts off. We were swiftly told to go play outside instead, and from then on my 'practice' was confined to time alone in my room.

For the next couple of decades I kept the ambition to myself. I even forgot about it during the physical and mental traumas of puberty and under the mountain of schoolwork, 'approved' hobbies, and sensible career expectations. By the time I felt in a position to think freely for myself, post-journalism degree, in a good job and at the grand old age of 24, I thought I was past-it.

An article in a magazine about an early-30s mum who’d just got a job in Stringfellows made me realise it wasn’t too late, but how to get into such a field? It still seemed an impossible dream. I was senior editor on the fashion website for which I worked, and had everything a young woman was 'supposed' to want, but I knew I wasn't truly happy. A year later, an advert for the new London School of Striptease on the noticeboard in the dance studio where I did street dance classes provided the answer.

I signed up for Undress to Impress, the beginner’s course from the school, run by the exuberant Jo King. Over six hour-long classes, we learnt how to perform a full striptease. It was a bit nerve-wracking turning up to the first class, but then Jo told us that we wouldn't be taking our bras off until week three, by which point, she promised, we'd be "gagging to". The first week was all about eye contact – the most important element of a good striptease - and facial expression, while the second was about removing outerwear. Jo was right about week three's class and after that all nerves disappeared. We didn't get completely naked – we learnt how to take g-strings off but had to wear two pairs to the class.

The other girls on the course were there for a variety of reasons – self confidence, a giggle with a mate, a surprise for a boyfriend. I didn't announce I was going to be a professional stripper – at that point I wasn't sure whether I was going to be or not – but I said it was something I'd wanted to try since I was little.

The beginner's course ended with a group performance – one half of the class performing to the rest of the class and vice versa - and a trip to lapdancing club Spearmint Rhino. At the time, the three songs I imagined myself stripping to were Kylie 'Can't Get You Out of My Head', Garbage ''#1 Crush' and Madonna 'Justify My Love'. As we pushed open the frost glass doors into the main bit of the club, the Kylie track started, and was followed by the Garbage track and the Madonna track. Shivers went up my spine.

Spearmint Rhino was a revelation. Before we'd arrived I'd found myself thinking "maybe this is the point at which I bottle it and realise I can never actually be a stripper for real." But I loved it. I’d never seen so many stunning women in one place – within the healthy weight boundaries, from very slender to plump, there was every size, shape and colour of body. The contrast to the world of fashion was incredible. What all the woman had in common was an apparent pride in themselves. The men were like children in Hamleys – stunned, in awe, not knowing where to look next. The experience put me on a high for days.

My next step towards my goal was to do Jo King's intermediate course, Exotic Expertease. This added floorwork and chairwork to what we'd learnt on the beginner's course. It was a smaller class – five girls – so we got more one-to-one tuition and feedback from Jo. It was also ruder, more raucous, and even more fun. At the end we had to do a solo performance to our classmates. This was nerve-wracking and we were all visibly shaking during our turns, but I loved it, and despite the nerves had a deep confidence that told me I could do it.

I'd agreed to act as a guinea-pig for two pole-dancing friends of Jo, who wanted to teach their art but needed a beginner to try their class ideas out on. That was a fortnight after the intermediate class ended. I knew that if I didn't audition for a strip club within a month of that, I’d find myself sucked back into 'sensible' considerations about my life and work, and it would never happen. So I began preparing for an audition.

I wanted to see what a variety of venues were like and so took my best male friends on nights out to strip clubs and pubs. The venues fall into two categories – pubs such as Browns on Hackney Road, and clubs such as Spearmint Rhino. In the pubs, the focus is on the stage performance. The girls go round the audience with a pint jug collecting money before their act and choose their own music, and may also perform private dances between their times on stage. At the clubs, all the money is made from private dances and the girls’ turns on the stage or podium, to whatever music is playing at the time, are advertisements for themselves.

I found that from the classiest to the seediest, the thing I loved about them was the same – to be in an environment where men completely relaxed and enjoyed themselves. There was no aggression, no macho posturing, no edginess; they knew the rules absolutely – look but don't touch – and abided by them. It was like they were all supporting the same winning football team. It was a world away from the aggressive misogynistic stereotype.

I also took the opportunity to speak to the girls – as the ladies' loo is usually the changing room this was easily done. I found them to be open, friendly, and positive about their jobs, happy to chat about men, management and money and dish out advice. Again, their stories were a world away from the stereotype of desperate women who hate the punters.

During a night out with Jo King to some East End strip venues, we went to a pub which I'd heard good things about from the girls. Family-run and unmodernised, it offered a small three-foot-high stage, and nothing else. I was initially unimpressed, until a dancer came on and did a semi-comedy Western act. She had a dizzy Cameron Diaz blonde look, but would switch in a moment from acting ditzy to being devastatingly sexy. It was proper performance, the men were entranced, and she seemed to be having a great time. It was the first act I'd seen which seemed to incorporate the spirit of what Jo King had taught me, and Jo advised that it would be a good place for me to try out being a stripper for real.

I called the pub to arrange an audition, which with Jo's name behind me didn't pose a problem. Auditions took place in the early evening, on the stage and to whoever was in the pub at the time. I'd also go round with a jug and collect money beforehand.

With a day and time arranged, the nerves began to grate. I'd wondered all along whether there would be a point beyond which I found I couldn't go, and this – a performance in front of a whole pub-full of men – was the ultimate test. I wondered for the first time what I'd do if it didn't work out – it would be my very earliest ambition destroyed.

On the day of the audition I felt sick with nerves. I'd chosen my music and outfit carefully and practiced my routine thoroughly. I took the afternoon off from my day job, so I could go home first for one last run-through. By the time I actually got to the pub a kind of numbness had set in.

I collected my money, telling men who chatted to me that it was my audition. By the time I heard my music start and ascended to the stage, I was hardly feeling a thing. I was fine until I started taking my dress off, at which point my legs began shaking uncontrollably. The dress getting stuck on the buckles of not one but both of my five inch Perspex heeled shoes didn't help either. But I remembered what Jo King had told me – always look confident, always look like you know what you're doing – and managed to get through the hick-up. And from there on I found that the more clothes I took off, the more confident I felt. I was getting encouraging smiles from the men I'd spoken to and double thumbs-up signs from one in particular, which helped. The moment of sliding my knickers down and opening my legs for the first time – which was the one I'd been most apprehensive about – was great.

The applause at the end was amazing. I floated off the stage and must have been grinning like the Cheshire Cat. A few men came to speak to me to say they'd loved the performance. Then I got the most important verdict from the manager: he told me that there were lots of auditions going on, that so many girls want to be strippers, and he was turning most down – but that I'd got the job, and he'd put me on the books from the following month.

I started working one shift a week there, keeping the day job full time. The sensation of doing what I felt I was put on this earth to do was amazing, and the high of having gone out and got what I wanted, despite it going completely again convention and taking considerable guts and hard work, was great.

After three months I went part-time in my day job with the full support of my boss in order to do more dancing. I tried some table dance club work, but decided I preferred the pubs and joined a strip pub agency. A year later I packed in the day job completely.

Now I strip in and around London for two pub agencies and at Soho’s oldest strip venue Sunset Strip. I’ve been nominated in the Stripper Of The Year category in the Erotic Awards twice, and am now a judge for the Awards. Once I’d had some experience, Jo King asked me to teach for London School of Striptease, which is something I love doing. I also became interested in rights for those working in the sex industry and joined the International Union Of Sex Workers, with whom I have since travelled as far afield as Taiwan and Belgium taking part in demonstrations and events.

In total I’ve danced at 32 different venues, and my current rota includes around 10, from crumbling old East End pubs to the relative luxury of Sunset Strip. I’ve had experiences ranging from the blissful to the surreal to the downright scary – the good far outweigh the bad, but I value them all.

Read Solitaire’s ‘Diary Of A Stripper’ coming soon on Strictly Broadband....

© Strictly Broadband.com June 2006