|
advertisement
|
Friday, April 09,
2004
While nightlife options for straight black women seem
to be plentiful, for area African American lesbians
there are only a handful of club options on any given
night. And they are often noisy and overcrowded.
From this lack of variety Inhertwined Entertainment
sprung forth about 18 months ago as the party promotion
company responsible for the popular Merge happy hours,
which are held every second Friday of the month at Club
Daedalus, in downtown Washington.
Smiling women immediately greet guests as they enter
the club, which has a dress code that discourages jeans
and athletic wear. Inside, they lounge in cushy chairs
or at one of two bars, nibbling hors d’oeuvres and
sipping drinks.
Women groove to house and R&B music on a sunken,
mirror-surrounded dance floor in the center of Club
Daedalus. Others flock to the recently opened VIP
lounge, complete with expansive couches and, on
occasion, chocolate covered strawberries.
Fights, a common occurrence at some other
lesbian-oriented nightspots, are unheard of at
Inhertwined events.
The gatherings are all inspired by the vision of Tara
“TJ” Tolbert and Alana Keigh Futrell, who created the
party promotion company in 2002. Jay Morrow, 31, would
later join the women, handling promotions.
Then new to the local lesbian party scene, Tolbert
says she and Futrell, both 26, visited established spots
such as Wet, which holds monthly gatherings at a club in
Southeast D.C. with exotic dancers and wet underwear
contests, and Delta Elite, a club in Northeast D.C. that
has long been home to Friday evening parties for black
gay women. But they would often leave these nightspots
drenched in sweat.
“We wanted to be in a place where we could dress up
and feel comfortable and not stick out,” Tolbert says.
The answer, they thought, was to start their own
party. Of course, it would need a catchy name.
“We wanted something that induced a sensuality — but
a subtle sensuality,’’ she says. “We wanted to make it
known we were for women.”
The result was “Inhertwined,” a play on the word
intertwined, which means to join or become joined by
twining together. Later, the promoters would use the
word mixture as inspiration in naming their party series
Merge.
“I went to Blackplanet.com [a Web site with
entertainment news and personal ads for African
Americans] and started kind of putting out ‘coming soon’
information on my page,’’ Tolbert says, acknowledging
that her first attempts yielded few leads. “One
particular young lady came to my site and told her
friend.”
That friend turned out to be Stephanie Robinson, then
purveyor of Between Friends, a lesbian-owned club on U
Street in Northwest D.C. that is temporarily closed
following a recent fatal stabbing on the premises during
a night reserved for mostly straight fans of go-go
music.
With Robinson’s contacts and using an Internet-based
company model, the women were soon in business, Morrow
says.
They held the first Merge in December 2002 at
Acropolis, a restaurant-lounge in Northwest D.C., on
Connecticut Ave. That night, Tolbert scanned the club,
hopeful women would soon come. They did — all 32 of
them.
The promoters would end up paying the club $300 that
night, the difference between what they earned and the
bar’s $1,500 minimum profit.
Still, they personally thanked each of the women and
looked forward to the next event.
“With good atmosphere and good food, you’re gonna
tell your friends,’’ Tolbert says. “And that’s what
happened the next month.”
They relocated to Vermont Avenue in April 2003, and
continued their success with upscale appeal in a party
scene that often sees more football jerseys and
Timberland boots than sexy blouses and pumps.
Merge also offers other substantial differences.
Rather than an all-night party, it takes places from 6
to 11 p.m., which Tolbert says is ideal for women who
might want to try other nightspots afterwards. The
parties are also just once a month, something Futrell
says helps preserve the “special event” nature.
But creating a weekly Merge event has been curtailed
by the lack of an available venue. “We’re still looking,
but that’s a hard thing in D.C.,” she adds.
Both features also help attract women who might not
go out often.
“We have a lot of women in our patronage that are
like that,” Tolbert says.
The women also pride themselves on injecting a touch
of class into the scene, distributing business
card-sized flyers, and enforcing a strict dress code
that increases the entrance fee for patrons in jeans.
Heading a small street-based advertising team, Morrow
says she targets women who look like they meet the
group’s target market: urban professionals between ages
25 and 44.
Area women are responding. By the promoters’
estimate, about 275 lesbians, ranging from ages 21 to
60, are turning out to the parties. And the person
sitting next to you is as likely to be a college student
as an attorney.
Hoping to build on their success, the promoters have
begun to expand, selling portrait-sized versions of the
tasteful nudes adorning their fliers, and even
sponsoring a local boxer. They also plan to feature
restaurant and movie reviews on their Web site, http://www.inhertwined.com/.
“We’re trying to be the lesbian portal that you come
to if you want to know what’s going on in the Washington
D.C. area,’’ Morrow says.
For now, the promoters are planning a masquerade
party and a monthly party on Saturday night called Say
Yes — both in May. A poetry night may also follow,
Tolbert says.
Despite the presence of other upscale promoters —
Women In the Life, a popular party series geared toward
young, professional black lesbians, and Pink Majik, a
monthly Happy Hour for black gay women at a club near
Dupont circle — the Inhertwined organizers say they are
confident that their clientele will keep coming back for
more.
“We’re constantly changing,” Tolbert says, “so we’re
always offering something a little bit different.”
| 
