Lew Rubens has a well earned, worldwide reputation for his work in bondage. Lew Rubens is also handsome, and a huge flirt. Freaky by the Bay, by Rebecca Anderson.

Rubens is equal parts playful, funny, driven, intelligent and deeply kinky. Having been interested in rope bondage since about the age of four, Lew’s life has been centered around his passion for restraint.

Lew broke into bondage as a full-time occupation around 2003, when his site boundanddetermined.com went from a part time interest to a full time occupation. Having been a ''cable guy'' (no pun intended) for 22 years, Rubens decided it was time to pursue his craft professionally and got himself fired from the cable company by hitting on a beautiful client.

After running boundanddetermined.com for four years in his native Washington State, Lew was approached by Kink.com to do a test shoot. Kink was understandably pleased with what they saw, and offered him a full-time position as webmaster of their Water Bondage site. Kink made Lew an offer too tempting to refuse and Lew relocated to the San Francisco Bay Area. The rest is history - Lew webmastered Water Bondage until its’ recent end, and was retained by Kink under the title Bondage Consultant. Today, Rubens is scouting models, opportunities, riggers and locations for Kink and recently finished a long stint in Budapest handling the launch of another new site.

It’s difficult to even describe what makes Lew’s work so incredible, particularly for one who does not do rope work. His use of unusual mediums is certainly part of it. Rubens will rig using rope, electrical tape, plumber’s tape, plastic ties, barbed wire...pretty much anything he can get his hands on. In one notable example posted on boundanddetermined.com, a nude woman on her knees and forearms is affixed to the porch of a house using metal plumber’s tape and wood screws. Apparently Lew placed her there in the path of the front door before a party as a sort of welcome to his like-minded guests. When asked about the safety considerations of using such inflexible materials to bind human bodies, Rubens indicated that his rule is simple; if he can snip through it with his shears without hurting the subject, he is comfortable using it. This requires the kind of vigilance and experience Lew has spent years building.

Lew’s work is aesthetically beautiful and truly reflects the ''damsel in distress'' fantasy. Rubens also frequently utilizes the great outdoors as the setting for his intricate bondage fantasies. The results are breathtaking, but not without cost - Rubens is now on the California State Parks watchlist now, due to a little ''incident'' involving chaining girlfriend Sabrina Fox to his Harley Davidson. Apparently the parks services have little to no sense of novelty in this area....

Certainly Lew’s creativity stems in part from long time experience. He began tying up other kids in the neighborhood when he was four years old, although not connecting it at that early age to any sexual activity. His need for bondage to be incorporated into his love life made dating difficult in the vanilla world. Lew entered the Army at 19 years of age still a virgin. HIs first time did include bondage, and it has been very rare that he’s engaged in sex without bondage. ''I’ve suffered for my kink'' says Rubens.

Now, Lew’s like a kid in a candy store, with beautiful, flexible and eager ladies lining up to be victimized by him. The joy in his bearing is palpable, and contagious. He’s a perfect man to have around any BDSM studio, a fact Kink.com seems highly aware of. Conversely, Lew could not have found a better home than Kink - a match made in...hmmm....

Lew’s work can be seen on Kink.com of course, as well as his own Yahoo group and boundanddetermined.com. Even for those not ''into'' BDSM, it’s well worth checking out. Lew makes incredibly beautiful, erotic sculptures using hot women, and he does it at a level very rarely seen.

I recently had a lovely dinner interview with Mr. Rubens and his Protégé, Luke Degre. Look for the next two parts of this series-the second introducing Degre and the third about my dinner with these two very fascinating men.