Women Are Buying Sexy Suspender Belts To Improve Their Mood

STANDING on the side of the road, Lisa (not her real name) looks like any other respectable lady waiting for a taxi. In her long winter coat, she says she feels "unbelievably sexy and excited". Empty cabs pass by when she gets the call on her mobile. Minutes later, a businessman in a silver car pulls up. She tosses her blonde hair and gets in without a word.

Beneath her unremarkable coat, Lisa wears a vintage red and black lace corset which reveals her breasts, her Agent Provocateur stockings skim her curvaceous thighs and a diamond love heart dangles from a sexy dog collar around her neck. This is not the first time her husband has collected her like this.

"Halloween is a great excuse for adults to fulfil their fantasies," says Justin Parr of Miss Fantasia, Ireland's exotic adult boutique.

"Couples and singles who may never have come to an adult store because they were embarrassed, are coming in looking for sexy costumes. We're so busy we've had to re-order the sexy fairy and the schoolgirl outfits, a lot of the men seem to be going for pirate costumes."

Halloween has had a fantastic spin-off effect for Parr's business. "We get your ordinary everyday people coming in here, it's like they've been given permission to come. I had a couple in here, at the start they were very reserved but by the end he had chosen an unbelievably raunchy outfit for his girlfriend for a party. It's great because while they're here they discover that costumes can be really exciting," he says.

Dressing up, it seems, is not just for Halloween and the occasion itself is now opening the door for many to a world that, for most of the year, remains quietly underground. A long-time fan of Halloween, supermodel Heidi Klum stunned onlookers last year when she dressed up as the Hindu goddess Kali (complete with blue body paint and additional limbs). On another occasion, she dressed up as a sexy cat.

Heidi has put together a list of dos and don'ts when it comes to Halloween fashion: "My one piece of advice is, really go for it. Buy a dog collar with a tag and put a fun message on it. I put 'If lost, please return to Seal'."

It seems that with or without the model's advice, we have really "gone for it" this year, with women, in particular, using the occasion as a licence to dress as provocatively as they like.

"I'm doing a Dita Von Tesse number, I've got the fishnets, massive heels, a velvet corset, I'm going all burlesque for the night. When else can you dress like that?" said one woman, who was off to a Halloween house party.

Now more than ever, the opportunity to get dressed up and forget the daily grind, even for a night, has irresistible appeal. "I love this time of year, I always make my own costume and throw a party. This year I'm a vampire police woman, I've got a navy police woman outfit but red platform heels, fishnets, suspenders and red bustier, it looks mad," said Andrea, an office worker.

"It's not just a children's event anymore," according to Parr, "for adults, this time of year is about indulging in fantasies and when better to explore your sexuality than when you're dressed up or masked; it's like total escapism for people who may never otherwise get involved."

For Lisa, as in the cult Stanley Kubrick film, Eyes Wide Shut, starring Nicole Kidman and Tom Cruise, it is the desire for new sexual experiences with an element of danger that appeals. "I like being out there on the road waiting, being picked up like a high-class call girl, that's the most exciting part, the dressing up. I don't buy cheap costumes, I have beautiful wigs, I love lingerie and antique pieces. The most exciting thing sexually is the fact that this is entirely our private game being played out in the public," she explains.

'Cos-Play', or dressing up, has long been a pastime of the suit-wearing Japanese who have usurped this once obscure Western celebration for their own adult enjoyment. Festive activities include clubs advertising 'Fetish Halloween' and 'Erotica Halloween' parties. "Japan's passion for Halloween extends a long tradition of festivals that liberate ordinary Japanese from the extreme control they face in everyday life," says Patrick William Galbraith, a researcher at Sophia Univerdity's Japanese Studies faculty.

"The matsuri, or festival, might be seen as a communal experience that allows behaviours outside rigid behaviours and etiquette, one reason this social pressure release valve has been so crucial in Japan historically," Galbraith says.

The appeal of a darker, mysterious and even erotic world is not isolated to those who engage in cos-play or visit adult stores. Rather, it has a huge mainstream audience who have remained fascinated by spirits and demons for years. Where once we had Dracula, we now have Twilight, Stephenie Meyer's four-book teen vampire series which has smashed records that until now belonged to JK Rowling. The film enjoyed even further success with 23-year-old actor Robert Pattinson, who plays brooding vampire Edward, being voted the sexiest man in the world.

Gothic beauty Kristen Stewart who plays Bella recently commented on the appeal of the relationship: "You have to question their (Bella and Edward's) motivations -- to watch two people so unhealthily devoted to each other. The weirdest f**king themes run through this story -- like dominance and masochism."

While many are happy with a book or a film to satisfy deeper, darker sexual curiosities, some will always venture that bit further. Angelina Jolie has been remarkably frank on how her sexual appetite led her to using knives during sex. Explaining her desire to experience a more "primitive feeling", she commented, "I started having sex with my boyfriend and the sex and the emotions didn't feel enough. In a moment of wanting to feel closer to him, I grabbed a knife and cut him. He cut me back. We had an exchange of something and we were covered in blood, my heart was racing." Jolie and her former husband Billy Bob Thornton made public their use of knives during sex and famously wore necklaces carrying vials of each other's blood.

Vials of blood may not be the most popular accessory as yet, but retailers have reported a remarkable rise in the sale of stockings, suspenders and suspender belts. Dubbed "the Dita effect", sales have been attributed to photographs of the burlesque model Dita Von Teese launching her new Wonderbra lingerie range with provocative pictures of her in black stockings, suspenders and lace bra.

Rihanna, Lily Allen and Katy Perry have also donned stockings, suspenders and corsets in recent photo shoots.

According to Denise Fraser, lingerie buyer for Figleaves, "the Dita Von Teese effect has certainly taken hold. Women are buying something sexy to improve their mood."

"If dressing up adds fun and flavour to a relationship, that's great," says Eithne Bacuzzi, a therapist at the Marriage and Relationship Counselling Service (www.mrcs.ie).

"There is nothing better than a bit of creativity, and if it's consensual, I say bring it on, it can bring some freshness and excitement and is perfectly normal in a healthy relationship," says Eithne.

However she goes on to warn, "no one should ever feel pressured into dressing up, if it becomes the only way a partner can get excited in a relationship, then a couple may not be communicating, no one should feel like they are dressing up for someone against their will, the message is as long as you're on board together, if you want to swing off the chandeliers, that's fine."

To help last night's Halloween revellers on their way, men's website askmen.com launched a series of 'Halloween sex positions' designed to help her "howl all night long". From "ghost rider" and "grave robber" to "pumpkin head" and "monster mash", the website urges readers to pick their favourite "spooky position" with each one explained in easy-to-follow steps. "The time has come to breathe new life into Halloween, to replace the confectionery-fuelled fun you enjoyed as a kid with the pheromone-laced action you want as an adult" boasts the website.

As witch costumes, pumpkin lanterns and flashing skulls are stored away in the attic for another year perhaps stockings, wigs and fishnets will be making more than a once-a-year appearance from now on.

There's nothing wrong with having a few skeletons in the closet, after all.