CELEBRATING QUEER CULTURE

The Kingdom Come #4

On December 1st 2018, we brought our drag king cabaret, The Kingdom Come back to Walkley Community Centre, Sheffield. The night was a sell out, with audience members rocking some amazing costumes and outfits. Its never too early for tinsel right?

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Host Don One was charm personified, his Brummie accent and smooth songs winning everyone round. Stellar performances came from Dick Slick, Loui Von Dini, Mo Torboat and Chiyo, who were warmly enveloped in the love from our audience.

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Host Don One from Birmingham!

As usual the cake sold faster than you can say hotcakes, and the Andro & Eve volunteers did a brilliant job of helping the night run smoothly. We want to say a huge thanks to them for giving their time to help at this night and the others we’ve produced in 2018.

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Loui Von Dini had treats for us all…

A massive thank you to Walkley Community Centre for lending us their venue again, to all the local businesses who donated towards our raffle, and our audience for contributing to our Pay it Forward Ticket fund. This fund allows us to provide cheaper and free tickets to those who need them. We raised £245 from this event through raffle and online contributions alone! Thank you! Here’s to more super events in 2019. Have you got your ticket to A Reyt Queer Do: Electric Dreams edition on February 16th yet?!

All photos credited to Ndrika Anyika. See more of the night via our Facebook album! 

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Pirates came ashore for the evening…!
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Mo Torboat. Spoken Word Artist. Musician. All round good egg..
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Dick Slick serenaded the audience…
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CHIYO

We’re fundraising…

As part of our efforts to make Andro & Eve events as inclusive and accessible as possible, we are fundraising to support our activity and provide discounted ticket prices for those on low incomes. Part of those efforts now include the option for those purchasing tickets for our events online at Tickets For Good, to make a contribution to our accessible ticket fund.

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We want to roll out our accessible ticket fund from 2018 so those on low / no income can get a discounted ticket for Andro & Eve events. Money donated via Tickets For Good will go directly towards ticket subsidies for future events. Fundraising starts now, so if you’re buying a ticket for A Reyt Queer Do, then please consider contributing a little extra money towards this fund. Thank you.

Thanks also to Tickets For Good for supporting us in this fundraising activity.

Volunteer Call Out!

We’ve organised a get together and training session for current and newbie volunteers with Andro & Eve on December 13th. With Vegan Cake! We’re expanding our volunteer event team to help us run our programme of feel good events. We basically don’t want any more photos to emerge of Drag Queens carrying chairs at our events.. Hi Apple Derrieres! 😉

So if you’re interested in events, love queer performance and don’t mind giving up an evening now and then to make ace stuff happen locally, join our friendly volunteer team! Ideally you’ll have attended one of our events before, but this is not a necessity. We’re looking for people who can commit to helping run two or three events a year and have a ‘can do’ attitude.

If you want to help us put on events, meet cool people, and guarantee at spot at our sell – out events by volunteering, then join us at The Old Workshop on December 13th for our volunteer training session. Come along and find out about Andro & Eve’s plans for future events focused on queer culture, from the duo behind Andro & Eve. We’ll be covering areas such as event management, health and safety (yes, we will make that interesting!), and the vision for Andro & Eve, as well as finding out a bit more about your reasons for volunteering. And we’ll eat vegan cake.

If you’d like to attend, please drop us a line using the contact form on our website. If you can’t make this event, but would still like to lend a hand, get in touch. Thanks!

Calling Kings of the North!

We’re VERY excited to announce we’ll be bringing Drag Kings to Sheffield before 2017 is out! But this time we want to program some fresh talent! Have you got a Drag King act you can’t wait to share with the world? Are you fairly new to drag and want to test out an act in front of a very friendly and supportive audience? Calling all Yorkshire / Northern / East Midlands based drag kings. This is your chance to perform at a new night organised by Andro and Eve. Just drop us a line using the contact form on this website before 25th October 2017 and we’ll be in touch to share more information. Thanks!

If you’re one of the folks who has attended our already very popular drag king night The Kingdom Come you’ll definitely be interested in this new night. Announcements about what we’re planning coming very soon! You can sign up to our mailing list (using our contact form) to be the first to hear this and plenty other updates!

Featured images by Ndrika Anyika.

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Could you be the next Romeo De La Cruz? Or Adam All?

 

 

 

Our Queer Sheffield

This post comes about after reading this article by Vibe Sheffield which hilariously describes Sheffield’s ‘thriving’ LGBT scene. Please. Hold my cuppa. Can we just giggle gleefully that Sheffield’s LGBT scene just got described as ‘thriving’?! If you didn’t laugh you’d cry. So instead of sobbing into our almond milk chai, we’re doing this. While we totally understand the need to highlight the good that happens in a city, rather than be negative, we also think the scene in Sheffield is in more of a germination stage, rather than the thriving and bearing fruit phase we just read about. Its also reflective of the wider situation at present where many lesbian bars have closed. The links will take you to a discussion of those issues. We’re of the opinion though, that there are more things a queer woman wants to do than socialise in a bar serving mainly alcoholic drinks! Think big people.

With that in mind, we decided to compile and publish our own alternative guide that highlights where, as a queer person you might feel super welcome and even, – whisper it – find fellow queer people!!! While Sheffield is generally a very open and friendly city, we have been on the receiving end of homophobic abuse / attention more times than we’d like, and we feel its important to highlight the very best this city has to offer for queer people.

Here’s the disclaimer: This is a highly biased and personal guide. (We’re both cis, white, queer, lesbians). It also focuses on alternative stuff a quick google search won’t unearth, and that we’d actually recommend. But neither of us can say we know all there is to know. So we write this with the hope that you’ll get in touch and say ‘hey, I know about this cool thing’ and then we’ll update this post. But we also know Sheffield is very good at keeping things close to its chest, so we realise all the queer secrets may stay just as that. And thats fine. But with no central hub that tells you all the LGBTQ+ things going on in Sheffield, it feels like this is a good moment to get something out there. To share the reality of trying to find queer spaces in this city. And hopefully help those new to town, or just new to identifying on the LGBTQ+ spectrum, where you might find your new queer family. And now to our guide!

After Dark

Well first off, theres Andro and Eve! Jokes. No really. We’re one of the only organisations in Sheffield creating regular pop up events celebrating queer culture. From film nights, to spoken word events, to our highly successful drag king night The Kingdom Come, and queer party series A Reyt Queer Do, you’re sure to be met with a warm welcome and DEFINITELY be in the company of fellow queer people. Our events are for everyone*, and can be found on this website, by signing up to our mailing list, or on Facebook / IG / Twitter.  *Occasionally we host Autostraddle Brunches for lesbian, queer and bisexual women / non binary people only.

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Romeo De La Cruz entertains the audience at The Kingdom Come #2. Photo by Ndrika Anyika.

Pity Like is an occasional queer club night focused on talent, inclusion and rejecting gender binaries. Its at DIY space the Audacious Art Experiment and if you like a sweaty, alternative club experience with BYOB you’ll love it. Audacious also hosts Cub Rush, ‘Blissful dance hooliganism – for queers and freaks’. We hear its good, but we haven’t yet checked it out. Climax is the biggest LGBT+ club night in Sheffield hosted once a month by Sheffield University Student’s Union.

Verse Matters is a feminist spoken word and poetry night held once a month at Moor Theatre Delicatessen. You’ll find a warm welcome here and plenty interesting haircuts. Trust us. Its inclusive and diverse and you can often get warm fuzzy feelings from the friendly vibes. Speaking of Moor Theatre Deli, they’re known for their weird and wonderful theatre and performance programme and support of LGBTQ events. Based in new venue on Eyre Street, we think it’s the friendliest theatre venue in town.

Daytime Pursuits

For many of us queers, going out at night is, well, just a bit much. The sofa and a Netflix session / queer web-series holds too much appeal. So heres the DL on what Sheffield has to offer the active queer during daylight hours. Its actually a bit shocking we’ve waited this long to mention ROLLER DERBY. Whoops. Sheffield has not one, but THREE roller derby teams including, Sheffield Steel Roller Girls, (A and B team) plus , The Hallam Hellcats and mens team The Inhuman League. All are trans friendly and inclusive in their ethos. If you don’t fancy whizzing round on skates at top speed, you can just go watch a match! Spending a weekend day at one of SSRG’s bouts is like entering a magical queer land. There’s plenty of stalls including those selling vegan food, a raffle and of course top quality sports entertainment.

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SSRG. Roller Derby legends.. Photo by Claire Brand.

Sheffield Hiking Dykes has the best name of all the names ever and is just great. One solely for lez-beans, so head on over to their Facebook Group and request to join so you can attend one of their once monthly walks. AFC Unity are an awesome independent women’s football team. While not specifically for those identifying as LGBTQ+, their inclusive attitude and focus on championing good causes means they have a healthy proportion of queer folk on the team. The Climbing Works is for those of you who don’t mind falling hard from fake rocks! But also. There can often be several queer women hanging around (quite literally), at the same time, thus making you feel the queer family is quite active. Also, theres a real friendly, chilled vibe and helpful staff to boot.

Lazy Queer Days

But I’m not active! We hear you say. If the last time you wore trainers for actual sports was in a PE lesson way back, when touching your toes was an achievable goal, don’t worry, here’s what you need to know for where to go on a super queer lazy day.

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Froconut by Fro by Joy. Classic Instagram pose by Andro and Eve.

Pom Kitchen is a newish vegan and veggie cafe on Sharrow Vale Road that does the best gluten free and vegan cakes we’ve come across. Courtesy of Fro by Joy, who also supplies their delicious Froconut (coconut ice cream). Seriously, you need to try it. As well as great tea and coffee and amazing banana bread, they serve things that are not sweet too. The welcoming staff and clientele are mostly women and our spidey senses have definitely picked up a queer vibe from many of those enjoying their Rainbow Bowls.

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George. Manager of Sharrow Vale Hardware. He allowed one photo only.

Down the road from Pom is Sharrow Vale Hardware. We include this shop solely because of George the cat, manager of said shop. Stroke his fur and wonder at its softness. He often sits on the counter and oversees his human staff. Kitchenware and cats. Lesbian shopping experience sorted. (Resisting puns so hard here). Insert your own. Other cafes you might spot fellow queers / hipsters* are The Holt, one of the City centre’s most calm spaces, serving a good mix of vegan and GF treats and great coffee, Tamper Sellers WheelForge Bakehouse, Homemade by Thelmas and Cafe #9, the latter two both in Nether Edge and offering good veggie and vegan food options.

* gaydar interference from hipster style is a problem these days)

If you like a good bit of queer literature, seek out Jepps Books, Sheffield’s radical book emporium. They stock plenty good queer magazines,  zines, and books, plus the LSGSM ‘Pits and Perverts’ Tees and badges. Originally situated at Moor Theatre Deli, they’re now in a period of transition, so you’ll find them at various locations. However, plans are afoot for opening a proper store. Fingers crossed. Also good for picking up queer magazines like Girls Like Us is La Biblioteka situated on Pinstone Street, Sheffield City Centre.

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La Biblioteka

If you want to get creative, Edge of the Universe Printing Press often host screen printing and zine making workshops. Fond memories of an afternoon cutting out fine shapes, and watching the print designs transfer, surrounded by many a queer lady, come back to us. With a real welcoming approach and affordable; it’s a fun way to spend a few hours.

Events

Like unicorns, the LGBTQ+ community can sometimes be so elusive as to be invisible. But sometimes, magically, they’ll appear at an event and the next day you’ll think, was it all just a queer dream? The following, are all events in Sheffield that happen once or more than once a year, and fit our ‘its a bit queer here’ theme.

Sheffield Zine Fest usually takes place in February and is probably the gayest space we’ve been in in a long time. Queer zines for everyone! So much feminist literature you end up rushing back to the cashpoint to refill your wallet just so you don’t miss out on this rich bounty! Its marvellous. We love Girl Gang Sheffield for their immersive film screenings, sharing positivity and empowerment for all genders. Events are usually announced via their Facebook Page. Catch Out Aloud, Sheffield’s very own LGBT choir at one of their concerts throughout the year. Their repertoire involves a good mix of material and concerts provide an uplifting atmosphere.

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Transforming Cinema is Sheffield’s first film festival focused on transgender and non binary films and storytelling. The first, held in November 2016 was produced by E.D.E.N film, who also often run film courses for those LGBTQ identified. Hopefully it will return. Peace in the Park is a free community arts festival offering live music, a climate zone, healing area and all sorts of other interesting stuff. Its inclusive and diverse and the vibe feels a bit like an early 90’s rave but with added yoga, trees and families. Peddlar Market happens on the first weekend of every month on Burton Rd, Kelham Island. With food, beer crafts and music, you can often spot a few queers in the crowds, and the choice of food just keeps getting better.

On May 17th Sheffield celebrates International IDAHOBIT Day with a one minutes noise, usually at The Peace Gardens. That’s reyt Yorkshire. Pride Sheffield at Endcliffe Park happens in the summer, and has both performances, stalls and a community tent. Its all free too. Bring a picnic and enjoy soaking up the rainbow fest. Sheffield Docfest brings together some of the world’s best documentary film makers. While the festival is still learning how to engage with the local community, it does offer the chance to meet some brilliant queer people and see the newest queer documentaries.

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Meeting Strike a Pose Director Reijer Zwann and Kevin Stea at DocFest 2016. Yep. Kevin is actually striking a pose…

A special mention now for all the live music that happens in Sheffield. Pick your fave artist, and hopefully your queer family will have also chosen the same gig to attend.

Support Services and Groups

The aforementioned Vibe guide gives a good run down on the support services available for LGBT+ people, so we’ll not replicate that here. Though we would also add that SAYit offer support to young people 13 – 25 identifying as LGBTQ+ and their families. T – Boys is a peer run community social and support group for those assigned female at birth who consider themselves on the trans spectrum or who are questioning their identity including trans men at all stage of transition, non binary, genderqueer and intersex people. Sheffield Bi Social is a social meet up group for bi/ pan people and their allies. Tiger Strut is an organisation active in Sheffield with the aim of increasing the visibility of South Asian LGBT people.

Activism

The personal is political for us LGBTQ folk, so if getting angry about this heteronormative world is often an issue for you, why not check out Sheffield’s anti capitalist queer group QASH (Queer Agenda Sheffield). They can often be found attending protests and organising DIY parties. Action for Trans Health also do great work in raising awareness and fundraising for trans healthcare.

Pubs

Now. A common misconception seems to be that all LGBTQ+ identified people are somehow really into terrible dance music and alcopops. We’re not. Luckily Sheffield is apparently the real ale capital of the world, and so we’ve handpicked some pubs where you can enjoy some fine ales in friendly and stare free atmospheres. The Rutland Arms in Sheffield City Centre does the greatest Halloumi Burger. Ever. Plus lots of other very tasty pub grub options and impressively leafy beer garden. The Broadfield on Abbeydale Road has a good cocktail menu as well as a chilled beer garden and The Beer House on Eccleshall Road, has a friendly atmosphere and great ales too.  There are plenty other great pubs and cafes in Sheffield, but we’ve focused on the ones where time and again, we get a warm welcome and find ourselves in the company of fellow queers.

So that about rounds up our queer guide to Sheffield. Phew. Who knew there would be so much? Well, there’s not. And thats the point. Partially due to rising acceptance of LGBTQ people, but probably more to do with economics, LGBTQ spaces are getting harder to find. Its great that LGBTQ people like us don’t have to spend all our time in one basement bar for fear of hate crimes, but at the same time, queer family is a real and important thing. Finding them makes life richer and more enjoyable. We hope this guide might make that a bit easier in South Yorkshire’s biggest city. And we hope to see you at an Andro and Eve event in future; a big warm welcome awaits!

If you want to suggest a cool place / thing we’ve missed off, and you can guarantee it fits our criteria of being queer friendly and being top quality, use the contact form on this website to get in touch and tell us about it.

Andro & Eve x

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The Kingdom Come #2: Holiday Camp!

On June 3rd we returned to Walkley Community Centre to produce the second edition of our Drag King night, The Kingdom Come. This time the theme was ‘Holiday Camp’ and our audience and drag performers sure brought the tropical, gender bending vibes!

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Adam All and Apple Derrieres, flamingo style.

The cabaret – style evening was hosted by Adam All and Apple Derrieres, scene superstars and founders of Boi Box London,  and featured drag kings Romeo De La Cruz, Luke Warm, Oliver Assets and Oedipussi. They all brought their A Game and had us howling with laughter and delight in one heck of a fun filled evening!

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Luke Warm remembered to pack his toothbrush...

We want to say a huge thank you to our audiences for supporting our event, and making SUCH stellar efforts with their own fancy dress.. And thanks to those who donated towards our collection for the End Period Poverty project. Once again, we’d like to thank our volunteers who are vital to making our events a success, and the Walkley Community Centre volunteers, and of course the performers for making it such an entertaining night. Check out the photos by Ndrika Anyika below. More photos can also be viewed by heading to our Facebook Page.

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Nicely Nautical audience members.
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Oedipussi makes an entrance
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Romeo De La Cruz is.. The Mask
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Apple Derrieres is oh so tropical!
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Oliver Assets living his Disney dream
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Adam All. Pecs.
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Yass Queen! Yass King! 
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Oedipussi lets his light shine..
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Andro and Eve in drag take to the stage..

Our fabulous audience!

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What an outfit. Tropic like its hot queen. 

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Finally, host Apple Derrieres shows us ALL how to pose.

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Whats in our name?

Why Andro and Eve? Let us tell you where our name comes from!

Well we love a pun for starters.. But this famous origin story of Adam and Eve called for a reworking in our minds… Something that reclaims the ‘woman’ from ‘man’ and says women can be so much more than the ancient stories we were told. Andro and Eve is a name that recognises women don’t need to be femme. We are androgynous, butch, dykes, tomboys. Also the divine feminine and ‘Eve’ character is also just as powerful as the archetypal man, masculine woman or genderfluid person.

We like our name because it acknowledges the blurring and broad spectrum of gender identity, and we seek to ensure our events and ethos are inclusive, and for us, queer community is about building a family outside of heteronormativity. We are about uniting different identities across race, class, gender, sexuality, disability and age. Lastly, our name was also chosen because we are keen that all women have a space they feel safe and free to explore queer culture, and break down some barriers that sadly, sometimes exist between different women and other marginalised genders.

Now we just need to remember all that next time we get asked about our name!

In this post, we’d like to acknowledge the pioneering and wonderful work of those who’ve gone before us, and were / are part of the inspiration for making spaces that promote queer and women – centered culture. In no particular order… Kate on Autostraddle in ‘Butch Please‘, Leslie Feinberg, Miss Major Griffin, Ani D Franco, Kate Bornstein, Bitch Planet, Susanne Sondfor, Audre Lorde, Angela Davis, Patricia Highsmith, Cheryl Dunye, to name but very few…

Carol; a film to make the heart sing

We were asked by the wonderful Moor Theatre Delicatessen last year to think of a film we’d like to programme as part of a festival to explore sex, sexuality and gender. The resulting festival Lets Talk About Sex Festival opened this week in Sheffield, and we’re very happy that as Andro and Eve we can represent for lesbian / queer women by presenting Carol

But why Carol? Well. Although we’re not blessed with hundreds of films exploring lesbian sex and relationships, there were a few other options but none of them so clearly put across a woman’s experience of falling for another woman in such a stylish and emotionally resonant way. We saw Carol on its release in 2015 and were already fans of the book, The Price of Salt by Patricia Highsmith, and frankly, we were blown away.

The two central performances by Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara are flawless, and the cinematography, costume and score, perfectly conjure the world in which these two exist. For those worrying that Todd Haynes film will ‘spoil’ the book, I remember being worried about this too. But somehow this film manages to capture the essence of the book, changing a few minor plot points, but making a piece of art that stands in its own right. Phyllis Nagy’s screenplay also allows us to see more clearly the world of Carol Aird, rather that in Highsmith’s novel, where we see the world through Therese’s eyes only. The film is richer, and more moving for this adaption.

Yes, there is sorrow in this film, but ultimately, Highsmith’s novel was groundbreaking in its treatment of a homosexual story where the characters (women too!) were allowed to have their hopeful ending. This bats against the still pervasive classic ‘lesbian must die’ trope in TV and film in a way that makes your heart sing.

We’re so excited to screen this film, transforming the Old Woolworths on The Moor (a fitting tribute to the way Therese and Carol meet!) into a homage to all things 1950’s. With cocktails, costumes galore and 1950’s music it will be an absolute dream to see this film back on a big screen again. We can’t wait!

Our thanks to Moor Theatre Delicatessen for their support in making this event happen, and SheFest Sheffield for placing this film in their weeklong programme to celebrate women as part of International Womens Day!

 

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Rooney Mara as ‘Therese Belivet’ in Todd Hayne’s ‘Carol’. 2015

 

 

Gender Troubles: The Butches

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We’re really pleased to announce our next event: a one off screening of Gender Troubles: The Butches, a new documentary by Lisa Plourde.

We saw this film at SQIFF in October and wrote about it here for Now Then. Mostly we loved this film for its warmth, humour and honesty. There are plenty stereotypes of butch women out there, and the interviews with butch identified women in this film show us that there’s a lot more to this identity than we’re led to believe. It made us smile plenty too!

Alongside the main feature there’ll be a showing of The Test Shot, a photo documentary project about transmasculine style. We found out about The Test Shot through Transforming Cinema, and loved the style inspiration so much we wanted to share it with our audience.

We’re also very excited to announce that we’ll be screening the short film Switching Teams by local filmmaker and Roller Derby player, Taylor Le Fin. Their film, produced by EDEN film, is a documentation of their journey in finding the gender identity that felt right to them, and the way their community supported this journey.

We design these smaller events with women identified, non – binary and transmasculine people in mind. We do this in order to make space for a group often not specifically catered for in the wider cultural scene. Our larger events are for everyone but with smaller capacities we feel we feel it is important to only invite women, non – binary and trans people to events, to ensure women and marginalised queer identities feel celebrated. This may change in future, but for now, its what we do, and we appreciate the support of the wider community in respecting this ethos.

This event is about celebrating and finding common ground between queer identities, while sharing cake, hot beverages and a cosy space. And of course there’ll be a few typically Andro and Eve activities to keep everyone amused. So we hope to see you there, at Café 9, on January 27th. Tickets are available here!

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