The Kentuckiana Pride Festival was a rite of passage for Arielle Clark. As a 16-year-old black woman embracing her sexuality for the first time, Clark walked into the festival and immediately felt welcomed by the LGBTQ community, but something still made her feel out of place.
The festival was predominately white.
And then on her 21st birthday, she went to a bar — young and excited about the legal milestone to party alongside her peers — but for her, the experience was uncomfortable and alienating. Raised in a sober home, the Louisville native has never cared for drinking alcohol. The party culture of the bar made her again feel out of place, especially coupled with the notion that alcohol often goes hand-in-hand with queer social events.
As a black, queer woman growing up in Louisville, Clark knew she needed something different: a sober space. The idea blossomed during her freshman year at Bellarmine University and turned into her vision for a tea shop. Back then, she imagined a place called “LGBTea.”
Ten years later, the idea has developed into what could become a Louisville’s black-owned, queer-owned tea shop — Sis Got Tea.
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