As I open the door to Margaret Corvid's office, a shiver runs down my spine.

Metal chains hang from the ceiling. A selection of belts, whips, masks, canes, gags and handcuffs are laid out neatly on a sofa.

In the centre of the room a gynecological bench waits, stirrups parted.

On the windowsill there are tissues, condoms and a wooden box of ominous-looking electrical implements. More of those later.

I tell myself to stay calm. I'm just here to report. Think Louis Theroux without the TV cameras.

Professional dominatrix Margaret Corvid
Professional dominatrix Margaret Corvid

Margaret, also known as 'Mistress Magpie', is a professional sex worker practising bondage, domination, sadism and masochism.

Her work is completely legal, and she runs a professional establishment catering mostly for heterosexual or bisexual men.

"People hire me not because they want to have sex with me, but because I am experienced in kink," she says.

"They want a spanking, or a role play, to be tied up or various kinds of feminisation.

"They want me to do their makeup, they want me to 'force' them to dress in women's clothes, some people want verbal humiliation.

"It's a very broad camp. You've heard of traditional sex workers – I am the 'and everything else' expert."

Some of the many 'props' inside Margaret's home
Some of the many 'props' inside Margaret's home

Four years ago Margaret, originally from the USA, was living in Cornwall, working in the tourism business and struggling to make ends meet.

She decided to turn her hobby into a profession, firstly taking up phone sex and then setting herself up as a self-employed 'pro-domme'

It is a volatile trade. In a slow week she might see just two clients; at busy times it will be seven or eight.

Sessions last for an hour, which she says is the optimum time for clients, most of whom are regulars, to "build up".

"The thing about kink is that it gets better with a partner the more you do it," she says.

"If someone is coming for a spanking I'm going to learn their reactions, their tolerance, and it gets better with practice.

"I get a lot of one-off clients because here in Plymouth we have a lot of business people visiting. Then they head back off up the motorway and I never see them again."

Most come through the door with a clear idea of what they are after; others just want to try something new.

"If I'm dominating somebody, I enjoy making their fantasy a reality," she says.

"I am in control, but really I'm a midwife or a catalyst for them realising their own desires.

"I enjoy seeing somebody going out the door feeling really happy. They've relieved tension, they've had catharsis."

She compares herself to a top violinist, taking care of her instrument and playing it to a high level.

"I'm in complete control, making beautiful music, but also respecting what it can do and respecting its limitations.

"I'm not getting sexual pleasure in a traditional sense. I'm getting the pleasure of a job well done.

"I don't necessarily have attraction to my clients. It's not like they all look like Brad Pitt.

"There are people from all walks of life, all different appearances and interests."

Professional dominatrix Margaret Corvid
Professional dominatrix Margaret Corvid

She shows me around the room and demonstrates some of her tools.

She taps a riding crop against the palm of her hand. "This makes a stingy sensation."

A wooden paddle – actually a re-purposed spaghetti portioner – makes a louder noise. "That can be quite painful."

There are bundles of red cotton rope; a traditional school cane; a flogger which "gives a bit of a whomp"; and a large stick made of rattan wood, still used today in judicial punishment in Singapore.

Finally, she turns to the small box in the corner.

"This is a violet wand," she says, plugging what looks like a small black gas canister into a power socket.

It lights up purple and shoots out electricity, ready to zap anyone who fancies a bit of a shock.

I move away carefully and resume the interview.

This all seems quite unpleasant, I say. What's the attraction?

"The submissive person is losing control," Margaret says.

"Whatever they think is horrible and strange, they are being 'forced' to do it. Really they want to do it.

"So they hire me, I strap them down to this bench, call them names, put panties on them.

"It gives them a sense of release from their own natural reticence."

Some of Margaret Corvid's tools of the trade
Some of Margaret Corvid's tools of the trade

Margaret knows I play cricket, an equally niche and baffling pastime in which middle-aged men subject themselves to pain, humiliation and ridicule.

To help me understand the allure, she draws an unusual comparison.

"When you do athletic activity you get a high, right? Like a runner's high?

"That's because your neuro system is releasing endorphins into your bloodstream.

"You can get endorphins from pain as well. If I'm spanking somebody, a good spanking with a bright red bum at the end takes about 15 or 20 minutes.

"At the end they are often smiling, laughing, they are not suffering. They are undergoing pain, but it gives them a physical and psychological pleasure."

It's not all about punishment. Margaret recently had a session with a foot fetishist who asked her to shave the hair on her big toes; someone else asked her to snort icing sugar off his body and pretend it was cocaine.

In nine years as a newspaper journalist I have conducted all sorts of weird and wonderful interviews, but this is unknown territory.

I feel my face getting hot as I squeak out a question I never thought I would ask: "Do people orgasm in here?"

"It depends on the sessions," she says.

"Some mistresses allow people to orgasm, some don't. There are quite a few clients who are not coming in for any sort of sexual contact, but others want that mixed with the kinky stuff.

"A good sex worker is a chameleon. Whether it's a mistress or an escort, we are there to meet that client where they're at.

"If somebody wants a bouncy, giggly, smiley performance, that's what they'll get. If they want strict and severe, I can do that too."

Some of Margaret Corvid's tools of the trade
Some of Margaret Corvid's tools of the trade

She owns a collection of outfits to fit the scenario – a latex military number, a couple of nurses' uniforms, even a black and white bird outfit for her 'Mistress Magpie' character.

The room can transform into a headmistress' office or a doctor's surgery.

"I am always improvising," she says.

"It's like jazz. You have certain things you want to work into a session, but it's not scripted. I'm reading the client's reactions and responses, their level of excitement, fear and anticipation through their body language and voice tone.

"I'm calibrating the intensity and sequence of what I'm doing based on that."

I'm suddenly aware that I'm sitting with my arms and legs crossed, gripping my notepad firmly.

My face is still flushed, but I'm beginning to catch on.

She employs safe words, a pain scale and a traffic light system.

Green means everything is great; amber means stop; red is to end the session altogether.

She tries to make sure people are fit and healthy before things get going, and that they have given their consent.

Margaret Corvid
Margaret Corvid

It is legal to buy and sell sexual services in this country, but Margaret must work alone or she would be classed as running a brothel.

She says this aspect of the law is not safe.

"If women could team up together it would be a lot better for health outcomes and to reduce violence.

"I want to see the full decriminalisation of sex work, so we can organise ourselves as we wish and band together for safety.

"Anything which criminalises an aspect of sex work makes us less safe."

Margaret advertises online and subjects clients a thorough screening process, but there is always an element of danger in allowing strangers into her home for such intimate encounters.

She wants to the see the UK move to the New Zealand model, where sex work is fully decriminalised and regulated, and blames our governments for perpetuating the myth that sex workers are unhealthy and immoral.

"They think they're helping us, they think they're rescuing us, that we all have drug problems, daddy issues, mental health problems, that we're raping ourselves or selling our bodies.

"When you're writing, you're not selling your finger, you're selling your brain. When I'm doing sex work I'm selling my professional skills. I'm selling an experience.

"A lot of the work we do is emotional labour. If somebody hires a sex worker they might be lonely, they want someone to listen to them, to make them feel good. They want to be the centre of attention.

"It's not just about spanking or intercourse. You're forming an emotional connection."

She says there is more to this than misinformed media portrayals: both Julia Roberts' high class escort in Pretty Woman and depictions of street-based sex workers as sleazy or vulnerable miss the point.

"Very few people actually know a sex worker. It isn't any of these myths. Sex work is work, and we want workers' rights.

"There are abuses in the fishing industry, but we don't ban fishing. We prosecute those abuses and we introduce reforms. We give the fishermen the political support for their right to organise."

Some of Margaret Corvid's tools of the trade
Some of Margaret Corvid's tools of the trade

She is not a fan of the 50 Shades of Gray series, saying it is inaccurate and misleading, but admits it has popularised what many still see as a mysterious and dangerous world.

"It has taught us this stuff is normal," she says.

"Most people have at least a slight interest in something that is not on the 'standard sexual menu'.

"There are several dominatrixes working here in the city, and there is a good market for us."

I got to know Margaret through my work as political reporter – she is a fellow journalist and campaigns for the Labour Party – but says she had to think long and hard before agreeing to be interviewed.

"I am an 'out' sex worker, I stick my head above the parapet, but a lot of others have to stay in the closet because they have other jobs.

"They are a governor at their kids' school, they are divorced and their ex-partner might go for custody.

"We're not supposed to think about sex in this society, except when you've got a scantily-clad woman selling a car.

"If you think too much about sex, people think you're some kind of pervert.

"Sex is one of those human needs. People need connection and intimacy and I'm very happy to provide that, even if the way I do it isn't the way other people do it."

Some of Margaret Corvid's tools of the trade
Some of Margaret Corvid's tools of the trade

There have been suggestions that the UK should consider criminalising the buying of sex, a move which Margaret says would be damaging.

"Tying people up and hitting them takes a lot of trust. If somebody is breaking the law by coming to see me, how am I going to establish that connection?

"If you're a therapy client and it's illegal to talk to your therapist, how is that person going to be able to open up?

"I have people's vulnerability in my hands. I have people who want to be made to cry, or to recreate experiences of bullying that have happened to them, but this time they are in control of it.

"People will sometimes come to a dominatrix to process things, to move on from an experience or to eroticise and experience which has been shameful to them.

"I think that's great, because they are taking charge of their lives."


Sex workers: What is the law?

Prostitution is legal, but many of the activities surrounding the exchange of sex for money or other goods are criminal offences
Prostitution is legal, but many of the activities surrounding the exchange of sex for money or other goods are criminal offences

Prostitution is legal, but many of the activities surrounding the exchange of sex for money or other goods are criminal offences.

It is an offence for a person to persistently loiter or solicit in a street or public place for the purpose of prostitution.

Other offences include keeping a brothel; causing or inciting prostitution for gain; controlling prostitution for gain; keeping a disorderly house; and money laundering.

Any premises – private flats, saunas, massage parlours – may be classified as a brothel if they are used by more than one man or woman for the purposes of prostitution, whether on the same day or on different days.

So, if you share premises with someone else and work on alternate days or weeks, the premises will still count as a brothel even though there is never more than one person working at any one time.

Working in a brothel, as a maid, sex worker or in any other capacity, is not of itself an offence.

The police have to show that you were managing, or assisting in the management of, the operation in some way.

If you offer sado-masochistic services involving the infliction of blows or other injuries intended or likely to cause injury, and that injury amounts actual bodily harm, you may be charged with assault. This can carry a prison sentence.

Source: release.org.uk