The Boy is Beautiful Issue 2

The Boy is Beautiful Issue 2

Published by The Boy is Beautiful, 2023

Fire marshals, plumbers, cops, corporals or sergeants. The delivery boy, the pool boy, the life guard, the paramedic, Val Kilmer in Batman, the Khal Drogo of men.com and the sweaty boys in Arsenal flannels spilling canned lager on a Central Line train bound for Epping. Welcome back, to the world of The Boy Is Beautiful. Welcome to ENSTOLO (Uniformed).

From the authoritarian to the submissive. From the testosterone-soaked to the
effeminate. From the crisp white cotton to the shiny black pleather. This issue pays tribute to the queer gaze of the uniform, and to those bearing it.

Leaping back 25-centuries-worth, we begin our journey facing the Lion of Chaeronea, which guards still the last fighting grounds of an army of 300 gay lovers. Assisted by the sun-kissed marines of Pireaus port, we board a ship bound for Hydra to meet the artist and curator behind Hydra School Projects, Dimitrios Antonitsis, at the first ever Academy for Merchant Marines in the world. A stone-throw away, on the rocky shores of Hydroneta, founder of Applied Research and Hydra Book Club, Josh Hickey, tells all about his uniformed days in a Catholic Boys school in Philadelphia and his lifelong search for brotherhood. In Athens, attempting to demystify the whys and hows of eroticised dress, Ilias Sapountzakis peaks under the 400 folds of the Evzones. Before joining him for a coffee at the National Garden café, I shed some late August sweat chasing after the first Greek queer rugby team, Athenian Centaurs, and their Macron balls. To finish us off, eight lads who have served in the greek army, one way or another, share memories infused with fear, lust, friendship and anal domination.