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Soft Places
Preserving the Lesbian Home Archive
The purpose of this project is to archive textiles from the homes of lesbians, and share the stories and histories of those objects and their homes. Participants are asked to bring any used/worn textile that lives in their self-defined home, (for example: towel, rag, curtains, tablecloth, robe, blanket, potholder, oven mit, apron, and beyond) that they are willing to part with.
The project will consist of a 1-2 hour meeting in-person, mending/adorning and discussing the textile and participants' experiences and associations to the idea of “home.” This interview will be recorded, and a quote excerpt will be sewn onto the textile. Participants can choose whether the recording is saved or deleted in the weeks following the interview.
This archival project posits that home textiles offer a fertile terrain for exploring and documenting queer domestic spaces. By engaging with themes of multiplicity, self-constructed identity, and everyday wear, mending, and remending, fabric becomes both metaphor and practical visual language for mediating outward expression and safe coverage. The collection will offer a small window into the potentiality of soft and tender visual language—caring, painful, vulnerable—and how representation and privacy might function together to show what is at stake in a more public fight for rights.
If you are interested in supporting the project, either as a participant or as a donor, please contact me at: tinarosemeister@gmail.com
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