The United States is a big place. Regulations vary from one part of the massive country to the next. Prostitution is outlawed in every part of the country with the exception of some rural parts of Nevada. Still the commercial sex industry flourishes. Some of it is above ground and in tune with the rules. Some of it is completely illegal and underground. Then there are the places that try to skirt the rules while staying in business. Lingerie clubs seemed to belong to the latter group. Though I am no longer sure that is the case.
Lingerie clubs are one of the more unique types of Adult entertainment establishments. They’re also some of the rarest. In fact I can’t be completely sure that they still exist despite my best efforts at research. I last came across a lingerie club in America more than a decade ago. I have not seen another since. Though admittedly I wasn’t traveling around the country looking for them either.
Then and now
I recently read that the owner of the fairly well known Chantilly Lace was sentenced to prison a few months ago. I obviously have no special knowledge about that woman or the place she ran. Though as a reporter I was immediately intrigued by the case. It brought up memories of lingerie clubs. So I decided to write about them here as they have seemingly been driven out of existence.
There was a time in the past when prostitution was widespread and somewhat tolerated in America. At least one well known brothel operated into the 1980’s. Then there were the areas where the sale of sex was not specifically outlawed. Finally you had the unofficial adult entertainment districts like New York City’s Times Square before Rudy Giuliani cleaned up the city.
In the 1970’s a guy could walk in off the street in the middle of Manhattan and get a blow job from a woman in a strip show. Or an alley. Then there were the live shows with the closing doors. As late as the early 2000’s women continued to openly solicit for sex on 42nd Street. Back then there will still more news stands than chain restaurants. Now everything is different. Today it looks like Disneyland. At least to a person like me.
What is a lingerie club?
But what about the lingerie clubs? As far as I know none ever existed in New York. They were common in other parts of the country like the Chicago area. As I mentioned earlier there are all sorts of different rules around the country. There are also various individuals and characteristics that arise. It’s the same as anywhere else. Go go bars in Manila operate in a different way than agogos in Angeles City. Those cities are in the same country and only hours apart.
Some American strip clubs have fully nude dancers and sell hard liquor. Others have women in bikinis and don’t allow alcohol inside their doors. Then there are the places that try to be something different entirely. One example are the side-of-the-road lap dance clubs. Another is, or perhaps was, the lingerie club.
Lingerie clubs often double as adult shops selling things like dildos and water pipes. They also sell lingerie. Women either work for the club or hang around inside waiting for customers. Then they offer to model lingerie for the guys in private booths off of the main floor. In some places the booths are like private rooms with closing doors. In others something as basic as a cloth room divider is used.
While I’ve never seen an employee manual for one of these places I would guess that the models are expected to model the clothes and perhaps even dance around a bit. In fact I remember that one place actually had a sign advertising “dancing girls”. The customers then would purchase the lingerie. Since the guys weren’t interested in a pair of panties and a bra they were actually just tipping the model.
Eventually and in some cases the whole ruse was dropped. Guys would then just leave out a certain amount of money in plain sight. This was a cue to the model to provide a particular service such as a $30 USD hand job or a $40 blowjob. At some point and some locations it got to the point where women would just come right out and ask a customer if he wanted sex. Perhaps that is the reason these places have become more difficult to find than the dodo.
I can’t say that the lingerie clubs I discovered ever staffed the most beautiful women. Nor am I looking to avail myself of any of their services. I can’t say I’m shocked to discover that these places seem to have disappear either. I’m more surprised that they continued to operate for so long. Especially these days when sex cinemas have disappeared from the UK and sex workers have moved on to virtual internet entertainment. I am not necessarily happy to see that these places are seemingly gone from the world either. But I am glad that I can write about this chapter of sex industry history here for you all to read and enjoy.
