Today's final article in our 7 day countdown to our V-Day sale is by Chanelle Rogers. She will be giving a Valentines tribute performance in the Passionfruit shop window tomorrow! Get your ticket here to make sure you don't miss it!

 Ah, Valentines.

Tis’ the season of all things heart shaped, untamed desires and temptations, beds laced in the petals of brutalised red roses or the uncontrollable need to douse EVERYTHING in chocolate. (In some cases, yes. Though we are always going to be the first to tell you your money is far better spent on the priceless pulsations of good vibrations.)

Have a historically accurate time this V-Day with a (consensual!) flogging 

This annual hallmark sponsored hoopla of debauchery has been celebrated among lovers for centuries, dating back as far as Ancient Rome with the festivities of Lupercalia. A “fertility festival” where our good friends the roman priesthood took to the streets to whip the women of Rome into fertility shape, sacrificial blood dripping floggers and all. Everyone would get very jolly, very drunk, and very naked.

from murder to romance with some strong robe-wearing in the middle

If the religious cult cliches weren’t enough, eventually the rise of Christianity came to play, told everyone to put their clothes back on, murdered two men by the name of Valentines for no good Christian reason, thus eventually declaring them martyrs and the day 'St Valentines' instead. Nevertheless, the festival of Love and Fertility did not cease, and continued to evolve as the day of romance we so iconically know as it is now.

Valentine's greetings swept the hearts of beloved sweethearts through the Middle Ages via message birds, to the 17th Century where tokens of affection were dispersed to blushing cheeks behind lace handkerchiefs. Cute.

Finally in the 1840s, a clever woman named Esther A. Howland saw the opportunity to make sweet cash off all the lovin’ hustle and bustle, selling the first mass-production of all your gaudy trimmings of a bumble bee pleading you to “Bee mine?”.

                   

Why yes I will, Bumble bee, the crux of all pollination of hearts around the world, yes I will.

LAST CHANCE to get tickets for our V-Day celebrations tomorrow, Friday 10th.

OR... Buy your V-Day gifts ON SALE TONIGHT! Online only, 7-10pm.