Walk past the E Pike sidewalk sign for Kink Center and you might expect something out of a dirty movie.

Step inside on a typical night and you’re more likely to find a board game in progress, a book club mid-debate, or somebody passing around cupcakes.

“I think that people see these opening scenes of The Matrix as the idea for what a kink club looks like,” said Luna, the volunteer-run venue’s director of marketing.

“… and we’re just in here eating cupcakes.”

That gap between expectation and reality is kind of the point. Kink Center opened last year as what its organizers call a third space, a community center first, oriented toward kink and queer folks and built around accessibility.

Executive director Raven Dubh says the idea grew out of need. Seattle has some good options for kink events, but few built around the accessibility the team wanted, and almost none affordable enough for a beginning organizer to take a swing.

“It’s a very expensive failure if you try somewhere else,” Dubh said.

Dubh said friends trying to organize their own events ran into cost and resource challenges.

“The more I was trying to help people do that, I realized they couldn’t,” Dubh said. “They couldn’t front that kind of money.”

Accessibility at the center takes many forms: masking and clean-air policies with HEPA filtration, ADA-accessible bathrooms and elevator access, rental rates kept low so tickets can be cheap or free. Continue reading →