See Bizarre's supersexy steampunk shoot here

It’s in the gigantic airships of Final Fantasy XII, the gilded sets of The Golden Compass, and the shadowy machinery of upcoming movie Watchmen. Steampunk was first an internet-based scene, but now fashion, music, games and ephemera from the world of ’punk are coming off the screen and creeping into our lives.

A few months ago, California hosted the first ever steampunk convention, Netherlands arts festival Gogbot had a steampunk theme, and SalonCon in New Jersey, which bills itself as ‘The Victorian Era For The 21st Century’, is becoming increasingly full of cogs and goggles. This year, the University Of California’s science fiction conference has a steampunk theme, and Seattle is hosting new event, SteamCon.

See our pictures of the California steampunk convention here

Jake Von Slatt, creator of Steampunkworkshop, says conventions take the scene to another level. “Going to events has been really exciting and fun,” he says. “I’ve been meeting all these other people doing similar things, and it gives me great ideas for new projects.”

And it’s not just the big events that are increasing in frequency – smaller regional events are being set up by enthusiasts. A gang of steampunk fans invade the New York Renaissance Faire every year in an event called the Time Travel Picnic. A group based in California called The Crew Of The Aperture go to parties dressed in character and have matching clockwork tattoos, while the new Ravenwood festival took steampunk band Abney Park to an isolated crowd in Arkansas.

The trend is yet to hit the UK with such force, but with Abney Park set to play at the Whitby Gothic Weekend this April, it can only get bigger. London alt model Darren Powell, also known as Demondaz, has been involved with the London vampire scene for 10 years and running London Vampyre Group events for the past three.

He runs a regular costume party, Vampire Villians vs Steampunk Slayers, with prizes for the best dressed guests. At the last event there was a catwalk show by fantasy outfit suppliers Sinful Temptation, and he’s hoping to include a steampunk burlesque show in the future.

“I was recently seduced by the steampunk look and knew others on the scene were also devotees, so the idea had to be done,” he says. “The nights have had the highest attendance of any events I’ve put together, and seem to be the most enjoyed.”

Greasy reads
But all this steampunk action comes from one original source – literature. New anthology Steampunk features the new breed as well as established 1980s writers. Queen Victoria’s an erotic subject in the story by Jay Lake, and there’s a comedy of manners from Molly Brown.

“The tales are linked by technology – whether that’s airships, clocks, or gears – and they haveto have a Victorian flavour,” says author Ann VanderMeer. “People are pushing the boundaries and also writing more romance.”

One place you can find romance is Steamypunk, a spin-off from webzine Steampunk Magazine whose members have even started selling books. In Margaret Killjoy’s A Man Of The Waste, a male traveller sleeps with a woman in a city full of clock towers. In Dmitri Markotin’s Emerson And Adalia series, a lower class woman from an underworld of crime seduces a gentleman of high Victorian society.

Dmitri says steampunk erotica means making the most of a Victorian setting and being true to real-life sex. “I really enjoy the heavy element of romance inherent in a Victorian or pseudo-Victorian era, and I enjoy the opulent language,” he says. “Most erotica is crap – some is degrading to women, some reinforces negative stereotypes and some thinks every person has unlimited sexual energy. Punk erotica should have nothing to do with that.”

Goggle eyed
From Adalia’s bustles to Emerson’s cigarette case – a big part of steampunk is fashion. Evelyn Kriete runs the Steamfashion Livejournal community and is a contributor to DIY site Brassgoggles. For her, steamfashion kicked off when people saw images of costume designer Kit Stølen, who created coloured hair extensions as part of an outfit that combined his love for Victorian clothes with his interest in cybergoth. Now, she says, her site is watched by US clothing labels.

“Steampunk is fashion-centric, and the next big trend, so if mainstream companies can create steampunk lines they’ll be in a perfect place to capitalise on its popularity,” she explains.

There are also many “accidental steampunk” clothes appearing in shops, she adds. In the UK, Topshop has ringmaster jackets and ruffled collar coats and Warehouse stocks tweed skirts.

One contributor to the steamfashion community is GD Falksen. As well as getting some of his stories serialised in steampunk magazine The Willows, he’s a history graduate who’s lectured at SalonCon and posts up historical reference material.

He says the proliferation of steampunk events means people have raised their game. “Usually people will have been posting about their outfit for the upcoming event, there’s a lot of excitement, and people might live long distances away. It’s almost like a sort of big event you’d have in the Victorian period, where people would meet at the seaside or a gala ball.”

The literary, the sexual and the visual collide in Warren Ellis’ free weekly FreakAngels webcomic, which was launched last Feburary. It’s set in flooded, post-apocalyptic Whitechapel, where twentysomething gang the FreakAngels try to come to terms with the fact they might have caused the destruction, as well as trying to come to terms with themselves. In episode one, KK realises she’s “fucked a boy from the Lambeth Road”, and spins off in her steam-powered helicopter. There have been over 40 episodes so far, and the first 24 have been made into a book.

“I wondered what would happen if the children from The Midwich Cuckoos grew up to be disaffected twentysomethings who lived in a near-future flooded Britain,” he says. “How do you go about making stuff happen if all you’ve got to work with is water? Steampowered technology was the obvious answer.”

Other webcomics use more subtle devices. Molly Crabapple’s Backstage follows reporters Johnny Panama and Elizabeth Delancy through the burlesque halls of New York. “Most of its steampunkery is confined to details,” Molly says. “For instance, Elizabeth sends teslagrams.” It’ll be going from screens to shelves when the first book comes out in July.

Steampunk also has a soundtrack. As well as the goth sounds of Abney Park, there are a host of other bands who call themselves steampunk – and artists who are retrospectively given the label. Two people following the trend are Emmett and Klaude Davenport, who host weekly radio show The Clockwork Cabaret, broadcast in North Carolina and via the internet. The show of songs and radio plays is based on their characters of a theoretical magician and a beekeeper – and an evil organisation called Clanng.

“Steampunk music is anything that evokes the feeling of a time that may not have existed,” says Klaude. “When previewing music for the show, I keep an ear out for an anachronistic feel to the music and unique percussion. This usually manifests itself as covers of traditional songs played in a non-traditional way, such as The Tiger Lillies’ take on My Funny Valentine or eccentric songs played on traditional instruments such as The Gourds cover of Snoop Dogg’s ‘Gin And Juice’, or Rasputina’s work.”

Hers and Emmett’s favourite bands include The Decemberists, Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds, Tom Waits, DeVotchKa, Vernian Process and Lemming Malloy. The duo run a club night called The Clockwork Ball, which has bands, a dance instructor and “psychopathic” puppet shows.

“One element we always include is the Interpretive Whale Dance,” laughs Klaude. “It’s a bunch of poor dance movements to one of my favourite steampunk ditties, ‘The Mariner’s Revenge Song’ by The Decemberists. It’s an epic saga of woe, revenge and whaling complete with an accordion breakdown
that’s guaranteed to get bustles shaking!”

At the events, you’re also likely to find music from Vernian Process, formed in 2003 by San Francisco enthusiast Josh Pfeiffer. His ‘steamwave’ music includes samples of and lyrics about machines. He’s also founded Gilded Age Records, a group of steampunk bands including Australian metallers Viral Millenium, Baltimore electronica outfit The Clockwork Dolls and London rockers Ghostfire, who’ll play with Abney Park at the London Steampunk Party in April (see Flagpromotions for details).

“It’s a collection of like-minded musicians who’ll help promote each other’s stuff,” he explains. “Once we start making a profit, I’ll start helping people produce their albums and turn it into a label.

Artisans of the future
As steampunk grows, so does the complexity of its art. Last year we spoke to Datamancer, who’s still modding computers with brass and has even used stained glass for latest invention The Archbishop.

Meanwhile Doktor A, who created the decorative Pac Gentleman sculpture has gone one step further with a new range of figures called The Mechtorians. They’re based on his fine art paintings and have their own backstory: Professor Maximillian Whistlecraft heard England was going to be destroyed by Martians, so decided to move it to another planet. He sent a mechanised workforce ahead of him to build a new society– but he never came, and they’re still building it.

“I’ve come to realise a strong story is an integral part of each creation,” says Doktor A. “It can put an extra spin on the work – though the artwork should be able to stand by itself.”

Role-playing games are also being influenced by steampunk. The “gas mask chic” game Unhallowed Metropolis is moving on to its second book – Unhallowed Necropolis – this month. It’s set in a futuristic version of London powered by a ‘Tesla array’. Co-writer Jason Soles says: “We went back to the fiction and scientific texts of the Victorian time. When we wrote Unhallowed Metropolis, we joked we were more ‘Teslapunk’ or ‘surgerypunk’ than steampunk. Of course, by now we make no such distinctions.”

Jake Von Slatt’s working on a steampunk car and guide with Jeff VanderMeer. He hopes the scene will keep growing, and that it’ll outlast its current burst of popularity. “A lot of people will be upset about steampunk’s commercialisation,” he says. “You’re going to get cheapened versions of handmade things in Hot Topic (USA-based alt superstore). But if you take it back to the music model, good jazz is good jazz.”