‘Is there enough cereal for the week?’ ‘Do we need more bread?’ ‘What about milk?’. I start to eavesdrop on the conversation and it’s all a bit Sunday at Grandma’s… ‘They’re going to do some kind of bakery-based sex scene right here on the worktop!’ I think of Fanny Cradock and snigger. Soon enough, I’m shown into the kitchen and introduced to the ten-strong crew (who will remain nameless – another one of the prerequisites of my visit). The only thing that vaguely says ‘porno’ is the white drapes slowly dancing in the draft coming in from the courtyard – and that’s only because it reminds me of the soft core aesthetic: playful, airy and light. Max Deeds poses with his shirt open on the set for The Invitation A house cat sleeps on a sofa, vases of flowers sit idyllically on a coffee table and the books on the shelves say ‘Sunday morning mass’ not ‘sex den’. Two hours on the road (including a fascinating conversation on the merits of ‘soft’ cheeses) and we finally arrive at our secret destination and I’m allowed to remove the blindfold (joke).Īs I enter the house everything is quiet. Needless to say I’m a bit on edge as I join Santos in Wimbledon and we make our way out of the city and into the wilds of Kent. All I was allowed to do was get in the car with Santos, head into the countryside and hope that I wasn’t going to be dragged into the bushes and murdered (‘This is what happens to perverts when they enquire about visiting porn sets, Gareth! Undo your fly!’). Joybear nil).įive, I wouldn’t be told where I was going. One, no wanking (okay, that was a rule I imposed on myself… I am not going through *that* Sunday School nightmare again). There was a week-long shoot coming up and he’d let me shadow him for a day as long as I adhered to some (strict) rules: The stars of the film, Sienna Day and Max Deeds, sip martinis while in a state of semi-undress Regarded the world over as one of the finest producers of ethical, female-friendly erotic content that caters for both him and for her I asked Santos if he’d let me join him on the other side of the lens. Joybear Pictures is a London-based production company established in 2003 by Justin Santos. Heavyweight stars like Sasha Grey and James Deen have appeared in Hollywood movies Stoya is knocking out standout pieces of journalism for the likes of The New Statesman and The New York Times and even former queen of smut Jenna Jameson – who relinquished her crown many moons a go – still grabs the headlines in California.Ĭloser to home, production companies like Joybear Pictures are turning heads and winning praise both sides of the pond and the plight of niche feminist and fetish pornographers, who find themselves at the mercy of new government laws, are hitting mainstream media outlets at a near monthly rate.Īs a result, the UK adult industry is shrugging off the seedy-little-cousin-to-the-US tag its held for way too long and is finally coming into its own.
Scroll through the fascinating five-part series below, or watch it full-screen here.Justin Santos, the founder of Joybear Pictures, let Metro's reporter watch him on the job To help flesh out the incredibly complicated process of making a deceptively simple garment, NPR's Planet Money team a few years back ordered its own t-shirt and traced its far-flung manufacturing path through the global economy. H&M is among the more transparent retail giants: it recently released the names and locations of what it claims is 95 percent of suppliers it contracts with – about 800 factories in Asia and Europe. Gap, for instance, only provides a list of the nearly 50 countries where its primary suppliers are located. And many brands have little or no connection with second-tier suppliers (who provide the raw materials). Most major retailers remain fairly secretive about their suppliers. But the route below traces a pretty common path. The cotton could just as likely have been grown in India or Turkey, milled in Pakistan or Mexico, and sewn in El Salvador or South Africa. It’s nearly impossible to trace the exact path of any given T-shirt. This is, of course, a hypothetical example based on the locales of the world’s top cotton and garment producers. The visualization above takes you through the process - from cotton field to store - of how an average cotton T-shirt is made.