On Jul. 19, 2023, the owner of the Wendy’s at 221 Weber Street announced it will be redone and accommodate a new 2SLGBTQ+ Bar, The Well.
As of Dec. 17, 2024, the location remains unopened despite promises The Well was supposed to open in the fall of 2023. Local 2SLGBTQ+ performers and event organizers look to the Waterloo Region at large to create safe spaces and stages for performances.
“There’s so much desire to be seen and celebrated, they’ll often sacrifice their own needs and their own comfort to you know, get an opportunity,” Mattie James, drag performer and local activist, said.
“So it’s really important to me to remind performers…they deserve respect,” James said.
James emphasizes the importance of clear communication and consent in creating safe spaces.
Their production company, Sasha Tease Events, ensures performers are paid and maintains a strict no-touching policy between performers and audiences.
James runs monthly open stages, prioritize new artists, and host events with a supportive, welcoming atmosphere. They emphasize the importance of clear information about the event and give participants clear guidelines on behavioral expectations at the shows.
“For about a year, I was doing open stages in the Toronto Gay Village. And that was really exciting. It was also very terrifying. There’s a hierarchy of drag, especially in really centralized queer communities of the most feminine cookie cutter, polished pageant, dry cleaned—it’s what’s most valued,” James said.
They advise newcomers to the WR Queer community to use social media to find queer events and encourage reaching out for support.
James is now the Arts Coordinator at SPECTRUM, aiming to expand arts programming for the queer community in the Waterloo Region.
“I have quite a few venues now that are very queer friendly, and let me run like, specifically queer events within that. But, of course, I can’t run stuff often there, because it’s mainly a bar for everybody,” Ari Baird, a drag performer also known as Papa Razzi and community organizer, said.
Baird co-founded the KW Gays and Theys Instagram page dedicated to hosting more diverse events. Although there are 2SLGBTQ+ owned and operated bars like A-OK Arcade and Bar, there is no bar or cafe that is specifically a safe space for queer and trans community members. The Order, an LGBTQ bar in Uptown Waterloo, shut its doors in June 2017.
In October 2024, Statistics Canada data indicates Waterloo Region has the highest rate of police-reported hate crimes in the country in 2023. SPECTRUM, a Kitchener-based organization for queer and trans people calls for more safe spaces for queer and trans folks due to the rise of anti- 2LGBTQ+ hate.
“To my surprise, though, there was a bubbling drag community here that was really excited to be a part of, and then the last three years, it’s absolutely blown up and expanded and multiplied in many ways. The flip side of that is there’s so many folks who are getting attached and falling in love with drag, and we just need more opportunities and more places to do that and get paid,” James said.
The Tri-Cities has a rich tapestry of queer and trans history. For 33 years, Cambridge hosted an underground lesbian bar called The Robin’s Nest which opened in 1977. Many community members are looking for alternatives because there is no update for when The Well will open its doors. Baird organized a year-end meeting for the KW Gays and Theys community and explored the possibility of establishing a queer-owned and operated business that provides benefits and appropriate pay and benefits for drag performers and other staff.
“It would have been awesome to have a space like that consistently every night we know the crowd is going to be queer, yeah, exactly, and won’t judge you, or at least will be more opening, open and accepting than most of the parts in other areas, because, you know, there are bars that I got fired from one of my jobs for being too much,” Baird said.
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