Welcome back to our interview series "A Tryst With..." Today we're joined by the intoxicating New York Dominatrix Datura Inoxia.
What has your path looked like on your journey to where you are now as a Dominatrix?
Like many in this industry, my journey into it started from survival. I have tried every avenue of sex work, but always found Domming to be my calling. It’s easy to just be myself, completely unfiltered. I’m not the first one in my family to follow this path. My mom was a Bizarre Lady (a German term for a Dominatrix that offers more than traditional BDSM), and she was quite open with me about both the good and bad within the industry. So, from a fairly young age, I knew it was a feasible career, if I decided to go down that path.
I grew up on my family’s ranch in the Canadian Prairies, training horses. Which provided a ton of transferable skills for both domination and protocol. My mom and I eventually moved to the US, and I started dancing while I was going to University. Life has its twists and turns, which led me to pursuing my other passions.
In my early years I would freestyle, dance, and cam, as I wasn’t really sure how to get a dungeon going. I started offering domme services in the VIP rooms of strip clubs and saw clearly my own potential. Eventually I had made friends with an elder Domme, who was gracious enough to let me use her space from time to time, while showing me the ropes my mom wouldn’t. My mom is supportive, but told me I had to seek that knowledge myself. I kept trying to learn as much as I could, from various people, so as not to end up in an echo chamber.
When I moved to NYC, I decided to go with a commercial dungeon. I learned a lot from the experience, but ultimately having my image and style dictated by the venue wasn’t for me.
I’m happy with where life has brought me, and I will forever be grateful for what SW has done for me.
What’s one myth about professional BDSM that you’d like to bust?
It’s not unusual at all to see a Dominatrix! People from all walks of life seek our services, and there's nothing to be ashamed of. Public stigma sadly still surrounds BDSM, but it’s really such a common orientation to have. It doesn’t have to just be whips and chains either! A Dominatrix can be a great way to explore what you’re really into in a very non-judgemental environment. Most Dommes are open to accommodating reasonable requests, as long as you ask nicely and tribute properly. Most of us are also pretty nice outside of sessions!
Even if you’re not sure where you should start, a Dominatrix can be one of the best guides.
How do you bring your own personality and personal style to your kink work?
I’ve always been one to walk to the beat of my own drum, and hate preconceived notions of how a Domme should be. I will always have a deep love for the traditional Dominatrix style, but it just isn’t me! I always thought it was silly that there were taboos about being both a courtesan and Domme within the professional BDSM world.
It was clear to me I had to just focus on what I love, to what is true to my personal interests and desires. I wanted to offer my bizarre skillset to others who seek the same as me: true psychological release, and otherworldly out of body experiences, in a safe space.
It’s hard for me to not be myself, and part of that is being a huge LARPing nerd. I spend a ton of my free time reading up on history, and the 1950’s~1970’s was a wild time for the American and Canadian governments. Both countries collaborated on the ultimate goal: A truth serum.
Datura is one of the many substances that was tested as a truth serum. It wasn’t very effective, but was great at inducing hallucinations and psychological horror. Datura is a beautiful flower that is highly misunderstood and feared, despite it holding great wisdom.
In the civilian world, I’m usually in head to toe 1930s-1970s fashion, which just adds to the whole ambience of a Cold War era spy. I’m eternally grateful that I made a beautiful life for myself by sharing my weird interests and being purely me.
Tell us about your workspace. How do you set up your playspace for maximum fun and enjoyment?
I am blessed to utilise the space of Mistrix Sade; my very dear friend and a favourite collaborator. Mistrix is one of the few people I’ve met who is on the same wavelength as I am. They have an aesthetic eye like no other, and I appreciate how every detail in the space was dwelled upon and considered.
It’s the most beautifully equipped space that combines form and function. There’s a beautiful sitting area with luxurious bondage furniture that leads to a pristine medical room with everything a fetishist could dream of. Any fantasy can be brought to life with ease.
I’m able to transform the space according to each session. I think about every step I’ll end up taking, and how to keep the fantasy flowing with minimal interruptions and trip hazards! I tend to wear 10” heels, so the less pacing back and forth, the happier I am.
I’ll display some of the accoutrements that’ll be used throughout the space, but I always keep a few hidden away for the surprise. I like to use blindfolds to help keep the mystique during scene changes.
What are some skills you’ve developed through your time in sex work? What are their broader applications in the civvie world?
Resilience, intuition, negotiation, time management, running a business, marketing, copywriting, web design and programming, photography, video and photo editing, creativity, and most of all – a deeper understanding of the human psyche.
It’s comforting to know I can survive any situation, no matter what scenario or industry it may be. I love being totally self-sufficient and knowing I can do anything I put my mind to. I’ve tried to be open about how I learned my skills while attempting to enter any civvie industry, but it’s never been well received. If it felt well received, they’d eventually try to get a freebie.
I hope that one day the general public will be much more accepting of sex work being a “real job”, or at least not stigmatising us if we do try to re-enter the civilian work force. It has been great to see public perception slowly changing, but we have a long way to go!
How do/did you feel about civvie work? What have its impacts been for you both long and short-term?
This is probably one of the most complicated questions for me! Women are sexually propositioned by customers, bosses, coworkers – even if they aren’t sex workers – so why not have it be on your terms, if you are comfortable? I was harassed daily at my civilian jobs, and was not being paid nearly enough to deal with it.
Earlier on in my Domme career, I was still working as a chef, as I had for many years. Somehow I was pulling 12~16 hour days and still managed to take Domme sessions. Food is something that I am incredibly passionate about and could easily do for the rest of my life, if it was my restaurant. Fine dining is probably one of the most abusive and degrading work environments I’ve ever been in. I was constantly propositioned and abused physically if I didn’t accept their advances. Tired of working for pennies and having no control over my time, I quit and went into Domming full time.
In the past year and a half, I started to dip my toes back into the Michelin Star world. I was incredibly nostalgic for my life as a chef and my industry friends swore up and down it wasn’t an abusive nightmare anymore. While I was no longer being burnt with hot pans by an angry chef, I was still verbally harassed daily, so I packed up my knives and haven’t looked back.
I’ve had some fun blending my two worlds, with a few clients who also book me for private dinners. Dinner and domination, who wouldn’t love that evening?
Sex work can be complicated and risky, but it provides me with agency over my body, time, and personal life that is completely priceless. I feel so much more respected and human doing sex work, rather than just a cog in the wheel for someone else’s business. Even if I stopped advertising, it’s something that I’ll continue until I can't anymore.
I have plans to open a farm to table bed and breakfast/dude ranch in the Canadian Prairies. I want to introduce people to the beauty of life on the Plains and Indigenous Canadian food paired with inspirations from French, Japanese, and German cuisine. Everything will be foraged or produced by my family and I, that even includes flour and butter from scratch.
We know there's a link between the construction of taboo to the construction of fetish, can you tell us a little bit about how this functions for you?
Fetishes in my experience are usually formed from either taboos or fear. There are most certainly taboos that I won’t touch, even conceptually. Even so, I don’t think negatively of those who harbour desire around certain taboos. Most of my personal fetishes have developed from the fear-desire connection. Fear can be strangely arousing because it excites some of the same neurotransmitters that are released during the arousal state.
Eventually my fear-obsession began to morph into what are now my fetishes, both as a top and switch. It wasn’t a cognizant decision at all, just one day a switch flipped in my brain.
Do you find transgression a turn-on? How does this influence your sessions?
It really depends on my dynamic with a particular person. In traditional Dominant/submissive dynamics, transgressions are an annoyance. My goal is to have an orderly and obedient submissive, and I have no tolerance for manipulation attempts. They quickly learn that good behaviour will get them the reward they want.
You call yourself a ‘cybernetician’. We’d love to know more about this!
Cybernetics is a vast field, and the definition tends to change depending on who you ask, and what their focus of interest is.
Let’s first start with a definition of cybernetics from the American Society for Cybernetics:
Originally the study of biological and artificial control systems, cybernetics has evolved into many disparate areas of study, with research in many disciplines, including computer science, robotics, social philosophy and epistemology. In general, cybernetics is concerned with discovering what mechanisms control systems, and in particular, how systems regulate themselves.
Stafford Beer on Control:
Probably the first clear insight into the deep nature of control … was that it is not about pulling levers to produce intended and inexorable results. This notion of control applies only to trivial machines. It never applies to a total system that includes any kind of probabilistic element — from the weather, to people; from markets, to the political economy. No: the characteristic of a non-trivial system that is under control, is that despite dealing with variables too many to count, too uncertain to express, and too difficult even to understand, something can be done to generate a predictable goal. Wiener found just the word he wanted in the operation of the long ships of ancient Greece. At sea, the long ships battled with rain, wind and tides — matters in no way predictable. However, if the man operating the rudder kept his eye on a distant lighthouse, he could manipulate the tiller, adjusting continuously in real-time towards the light. This is the function of steersmanship…
A lot of my practice has been directly influenced by cybernetic theories and musings of control. By applying cybernetic theories to BDSM, I’ve developed a highly efficient methodology for getting the desired behaviour by observing, adapting, and modifying the variables I introduce in the scene. All variables in session, from the lighting to my own behaviour is transformed to get the intended results.
I’ve always been obsessed with how things work be it humans or electronics. Anytime I have been presented with something new, I physically and metaphorically have to take it apart to see how it functions, and what its limitations are.
How do you spend your downtime? What do you do to relax?
Around the house I love to bake viennoiseries & pastries, hand embroidery, beading, researching whatever tickles my fancy at that moment, engineering bizarre devices, OSINT (Open Source Intelligence), and playing with my kitten!
I also love to play videogames when I can. Fallout, No Man’s Sky, Silent Hill, Minecraft and sometimes Call Of Duty. I spend most of my time hoarding on Fallout 76, but Silent Hill 2 is my first true love. I’ve been obsessed since 2001, and I can’t wait for Konami to stop teasing and denying the new releases!
Outside of the house I’m either antiquing for dresses & uranium glass, fossil hunting, foraging, hiking, horseback riding when I can, and just enjoying nature in general. I’m the happiest when I’m in the wilderness.
Is there a book, blog, tv show, piece of art, or movie that you’re into at the moment? Why?
If I put something on, it’s usually the youtube channel called Abandoned and Forgotten Places. It’s mostly about mine exploration, which is something I wish I could be doing but don’t trust my skill set for. I’ll live vicariously through him! I love seeing natural geological formations, abandoned places, and relics from the past.
My last meal would be: Shish-Taouk with a side of saffron rice and baba ganouj and covered in sumac.
If you want to win my heart you must: Be kind, willing to truly be generous and invest in my future.
If you want to buy me a drink, you could order a: Mezcal Last Word
I feel most sexy when: Tightly laced into a corset!
A historical figure I find inspiring is: Luisa Casati
Instagram: @rubbercreature
Want to meet New York Dominatrix Datura Inoxia in person?
Head over to her profile! 👇👇👇
