There is a sex doll brothel in Hong Kong where for HK$500 you can try before you buy. But is it legal?
- At Kwun Tong business, customers pay HK$500 for an hour with a sex doll
- Owner of This Mary says it is part marketing pitch, part social service for men who may have poor social skills
In dimly lit rooms on the fifth floor of an industrial building in Hong Kong, scantily clad women wait for customers who have paid HK$500 for an hour of alone time.
Condoms are in plentiful supply, while the workers at the Kwun Tong business are ready to fulfil a customer’s every wish – although as plastic sex dolls they play a passive role in proceedings.
This is sex and shopping in 21st century Hong Kong, where the line between brothel, and try before you buy retail, has been well and truly blurred.
Laws regarding sex work in Hong Kong mean prostitution is not illegal, but soliciting is against the law, as is running a brothel of two or more people, living off the earnings of prostitution, or controlling a woman for the purposes of prostitution.
The business in Kwun Tong is billed as an adult entertainment shop called This Mary. The hourly fee to play with one of the three dolls is part of the marketing pitch aimed at encouraging customers to buy a human-sized silicone sex doll, which sell for between HK$18,000 (US$2,300) and HK$30,000 (US$3,800).
