Community Building & Organizing

I've always believed that if the spaces you want to exist aren't there, sometimes you have to build them yourself.

Hairpins

My wife and I founded Hairpins in 2024 to create spaces for queer women and gender-diverse people to connect, celebrate, and find community, particularly in places where those spaces are few and far between. What started in Little Rock has grown into an award-winning, multi-state organization bringing people together across the South and Midwest.

Through pop-up events, parties, partnerships, educational programming, and nonprofit collaborations, we've worked to make queer community more visible, accessible, and connected across Arkansas, Missouri, Texas, and Minnesota. Hairpins was named “Best Gay Bar” in Arkansas 2025, 2026 and named the Emerging Minority Business of the Year for 2026 by the Little Rock Regional Chamber.

You can learn more about Hairpins by visiting droppinghairpins.com.

Beyond the Party

Hairpins has always been about more than a great night out at the bar. It’s about creating visibility where it’s desperately needed. Beyond our nightlife events, we've worked to build lasting community infrastructure through education, advocacy, nonprofit partnerships, and support for local businesses and creatives through our nonprofit arm, Dropping Hairpins Project.

Through partnerships with organizations like Little Rock Black Pride and Central Arkansas Pride, we've contributed more than $10,000 to community initiatives, supported dozens of LGBTQ+-owned and minority-owned businesses, and created opportunities for queer local artists and creatives to showcase their work.

We've also expanded into education and advocacy through PIN-POINT, a monthly queer networking event, Hairpins EDU, connecting community members with legal professionals, practical resources, and conversations about LGBTQ+ rights and preparedness, and Sapphic Cinema, an ongoing film screening and talk-back series exposing Southern and Midwestern audiences to queer media.