Henrietta Hudson, originally named Henrietta Hudson Bar & Girl, is a queer restaurant and lounge in Manhattan's

West Village The West Village is a neighborhood in the western section of the larger Greenwich Village neighborhood of Lower Manhattan, New York City. The traditional boundaries of the West Village are the Hudson River to the west, 14th Street (Manhattan ...

neighborhood. It operated as a

lesbian bar A lesbian bar (sometimes called a "women's bar") is a drinking establishment that caters exclusively or predominantly to lesbian women. While often conflated, the lesbian bar has a history distinct from that of the gay bar. Significance Les ...

from 1991 to 2014. Until it rebranded in 2021, it was one of three remaining

lesbian A lesbian is a Homosexuality, homosexual woman.Zimmerman, p. 453. The word is also used for women in relation to their sexual identity or sexual behavior, regardless of sexual orientation, or as an adjective to characterize or associate n ...

bars in New York City. Henrietta Hudson's location is the original location of the

Cubbyhole A cubby-hole, cubby-house or cubby is a small play house, or play area, for children. This may be constructed by the children themselves and used as a place of play. Autistic children can sometimes benefit from such places. Children may hav ...

bar, which had the distinction of being lesbian-owned and managed.

History

Lisa Cannistraci and bar owner Minnie Rivera opened Henrietta Hudson in 1991 as a lesbian-centric

bar Bar or BAR may refer to: Food and drink * Bar (establishment), selling alcoholic beverages * Candy bar * Chocolate bar Science and technology * Bar (river morphology), a deposit of sediment * Bar (tropical cyclone), a layer of cloud * Bar (u ...

. The establishment became New York City's longest-operating lesbian bar after the closure of other similar venues.

Gay liberation The gay liberation movement was a social and political movement of the late 1960s through the mid-1980s that urged lesbians and gay men to engage in radical direct action, and to counter societal shame with gay pride.Hoffman, 2007, pp.xi-xiii. ...

icon

Stormé DeLarverie Stormé DeLarverie (December 24, 1920 – May 24, 2014) was an American woman known as the butch lesbian whose scuffle with police was, according to Stormé and many eyewitnesses, the spark that ignited the Stonewall uprising, spurring the cro ...

was a

bouncer A bouncer (also known as a doorman or door supervisor) is a type of security guard, employed at venues such as bars, nightclubs, cabaret clubs, stripclubs, casinos, hotels, billiard halls, restaurants, sporting events, schools, concerts, or ...

at Henrietta Hudson well into her 80s. Part of the bar's ongoing evolution included removal of the "lesbian bar" descriptor in 2014. In a 2019 interview, Lisa Cannistraci said she did not "care whether or not it is known specifically as a lesbian bar...I just want people to come and have a great experience." Following its closure due to the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identif ...

, Cannistraci announced plans to rebrand and expand Henrietta Hudson into a "café, lounge, bistro, coffee house, ndcocktail place". The rebranding, however, resulted in controversy due to Cannistraci soliciting financial contributions from lesbians with a "Save the Bar"

crowdfunding Crowdfunding is the practice of funding a project or venture by raising money from a large number of people, typically via the internet. Crowdfunding is a form of crowdsourcing and alternative finance. In 2015, over was raised worldwide by crow ...

for Henrietta Hudson, "Support Henriettas"
(April 8, 2020). ''

GoFundMe GoFundMe is an American for-profit crowdfunding platform that allows people to raise money for events ranging from life events such as celebrations and graduations to challenging circumstances like accidents and illnesses. From 2010 to the b ...

''. Retrieved 15 June 2021. and also participating in the

Lesbian Bar Project The Lesbian Bar Project is a campaign created by Erica Rose and Elina Street to "celebrate, support, and preserve the remaining lesbian bars in the US." The project launched on October 28, 2020 with a PSA video narrated by Lea DeLaria that annou ...

fundraising Fundraising or fund-raising is the process of seeking and gathering voluntary financial contributions by engaging individuals, businesses, charitable foundations, or governmental agencies. Although fundraising typically refers to efforts to gathe ...

campaign to save lesbian bars, despite using the donations to reopen the venue as a "queer" space no longer catering exclusively to lesbians.

References

External links

* {{LGBT in New York 1991 establishments in New York City Organizations established in 1991 Bars (establishments) LGBT drinking establishments in New York City LGBT nightclubs in New York (state) Nightclubs in New York City West Village

History

See also

References

External links