bondage website review:

Restrained Elegance

www.restrainedelegance.com is primarily a bondage website. Most of the pictures and video show beautiful women in bondage, but additional fetish and mild BDSM material is included. This is a very high quality site, constructed with dedication, skill and enthusiasm by Hywel Phillips.

site philosophy

"Glamour lies beneath the clothes. Beauty lies behind the eyes."

Restrained Elegance portrays women in a very positive manner. Although the women are submissive and, more often than not, fastened in bondage, this site highlights the elegance, beauty and glamour of these women. It is clear that Hywel regards women with a great deal of respect and admiration, and this comes through the website very clearly. Even when the ladies are being subjected to pain!

This is a bondage website that simply oozes quality on every level - the pictures, video, site navigation and usability are all superb. Because of my own experience I can probably see more easily than casual visitors, how much careful thought and dedication has gone into the construction of this website. I find it very impressive.

Fetish material is mainly mild to medium bondage, but includes non-bondage material and pain (not extreme). Hywel is another webmaster (apart from myself) who enjoys taking pictures of women just to show off their beauty.

Clothing is highly varied, ranging from nude to elaborate and ornate costumes (such as mediaeval European). Many pictures are in the form of fictional photostories, with short accompanying text.

webmaster and photographer

The webmaster and photographer at Restrained Elegance is Hywel Phillips, who is a fellow countryman of mine (UK). In fact he and I have a great deal in common, further than an interest in bondage and photography. We are both self-taught webmasters and bondophiles, and we both aspire to produce high quality material in as professional manner as possible. Furthermore we both regard women with a great deal of respect, and aim to show off the allure and glamour of women in bondage. It is also nice to see an "adult" webmaster posting pictures of ladies faces! After all, is there anything more beautiful in the world than the face of a lovely woman?

bondage pictures

The quality of Hywel's bondage pictures is absolutely superb! I do not think I have seen better quality pictures anywhere on the web. The pictures are large, crisp and clear. Regarding the subject matter, many are somewhat stylised with very simple backgrounds, and of course this also leads to smaller file sizes and faster download times.

Some pictures are presented as fictional photostories. It seems that Hywel has a dramatic streak in him, because many of his stories and shoots involve elaborate and sumptuous costumes and locations. The range of clothing includes fetish and nudity, and I absolutely love the pictures of Rosaleen Young as a belly dancer! (see samples below).

Members of ebony-bondage.org can view some full size samples in the members area, while non-members can view some samples in the preview area of Restrained Elegance. It is worth noting that, unlike pictures at Ebony Bondage, old material is periodically removed from the website. However the back catalogue is mostly available on the token galleries, and the archive section features older sets as well.

bondage videos

Quality is again apparent in the video clips. These are shown at high resolution, and you really need a fast internet connection to download the largest of these before the next ice age. However smaller size files are also available, and as with the photographs, the quality here is superb whether you are judging on technical, artistic, or erotic merit. Once again, I am very impressed.

bondage models

It is a testament to the quality of Hywel's work that the one and only Ashley Renee contacted him, and flew him to the USA at her own expense to photograph her! Hywel went with one of his favourite UK models, Jasmine Sinclair, and the pictures that resulted from this "meeting of minds" are stunning.

Bondage models on the Restrained Elegance website include a whole host of famous names, including Andrea Neal, Ashley Renee, Chanta Rose, Gemma Craven, Jasmine Sinclair, Morrigan Hel, Rosaleen Young, and the extraordinary Stacy Burke.

website

The website is designed by Hywel Phillips, and operated under licence by Cool Piranha. Historically unusual for an adult website, a privacy policy, billing policy and terms and conditions are posted on this site (although you can expect to see these appearing on many adult sites soon, due to new regulations that are being put into place by the credit card companies).

Website design is impressive in its simplicity and ease of use. It is obvious that a great deal of thought has gone into planning the website itself. Everything seems to have been arranged to make the visit as easy as possible for members to view and download material.

Photographs are arranged in picture stories or galleries, with high quality thumbnails. The size (in kB) of each picture file is indicated, and each gallery provides an option to download all pictures in that gallery as a zip file. Now that is considerate of members interests!

Some of the content can also be accessed using tokens, if you do not want to buy membership. Additional material is added to the site on a daily basis.

additional content

A Restrained Elegance calendar for 2003 is available to buy in the online shop, and there is some of Hywel's artwork on sale also.

There is an impressive selection of guest galleries, once again very clearly presented.

sample bondage pictures

Hywel allowed me to select the small sample of bondage pictures shown as thumbnails below. I chose these to give as fair a representation of his site as I can, but I steered away from the more fully clothed scenes due to my personal preference! Of course, this small sample can only give you a glimpse of the material on offer.

More samples of Hywel's pictures can be viewed in the public area of Restrained Elegance.