Leading LGBT community space and store to close its doors

Stephen Price

A city-centre queer community space and dedicated LGBT shop is set to close its doors after struggling to keep up with rising overheads.

Cardiff’s Queer Emporium is a queer community space, events space and shop based in Cardiff stocking over local LGBT+ businesses.

Starting as a pop-up shop in June 2021, they quickly went on to become one of south Wales most recognisable queer brands, with all profits going towards supporting LGBT+ community projects.

Almost exclusively operated by trans,  intersex and non binary community members, The Queer Emporium describe themselves as “a home for minority genders and strives to create an affirming safe space with needed events and workshops for the community”, and put on regular events to bring together communities from across Wales.

The Queer Emporium was founded as a pop-up in Royal Arcade, Cardiff for Pride Month in 2021. The idea was to bring individual LGBT+ market stalls into a single space.

The venture came about after Yan (CEO) and his partner, Dan, ran market stalls during the COVID-19 lockdown for their queer social enterprises.

The pop-up was a huge success, generating wide-spread attention from the community and media alike, and they then decided to take on the space in Morgan Quarter for the long-term, going on to launch brunches, drag shows, talks and events including ‘Litteray Bent: Communal Play Readings’, Speed Friendshipping, Skye’s Craft Circle and Funny Huns Comedy.

The Emporium was also responsible for organising Cardiff’s first LGBTQI+ Fringe Festival, celebrating queer theatre, comedy, live music, film, drag, visual art exhibitions, dance and digital arts.

“Not a great time for the high street”

In an emotional statement delivered to their social media accounts on Wednesday 4 March, the Emporium shared the news that it is to close this summer.

 

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They shared: “2026 marks five years on from when we originally launched and, unfortunately, it will also be our last in The Royal Arcade. Originally, we were a pop-up, which turned into a three month lease, and now it’s 2026 and that is because so many of you came, supported us and all the local LGBTQ+ businesses and artists we’ve been so fortunate to work with in recent years. 

“Sadly, as we all know, it is not a great time for the high street, and that is true of for us as a small LGBTQ+ non-profit: trade is struggling to keep up with inflation, costs are going up faster than we can plan for and it just isn’t sustainable to run a city centre operated site in these conditions. This has resulted in both me (Yan) and my partner often having to go without pay and if it wasn’t for the support of friends and family we wouldn’t have made it this far (a massive thank you to all of you). We don’t want that to take away from the incredible impact we can see the shop has had on the community, but we also need to acknowledge the economic reality that is before us. 

“We have also made this decision rather than compromise on any of our ethics – making sure our team are always paid in line with the Living Wage Foundation’s rates, making sure we pay acts and artists as best we can and keeping our commission on sales as low as possible. To give you an idea of how seriously we take all of this, I’ve even emailed all of the major coffee syrup companies to ensure we only use ones with ethically sourced sugar. This all worked in 2021, but since opening we have seen our energy bills double, insurance premiums increase by thousands of pounds, wage bills jump and service charges keep going up.

“This isn’t us saying none of these increased costs are not justified – it’s a chain reaction that we understand we are part of. To carry on, we would have to pass those increased costs onto you, our customers, which we do not want to do when we already simply aren’t getting enough people through the door at the moment anyway.”

“For a lot of our events, the market for queer shows in Cardiff has become  increasingly populated, which is incredible to see in Cardiff and a testament to the abilities in the community, but makes it difficult to attract and maintain audiences to make them viable. The high labour costs to convert a shopping arcade to a performance space also mean it isn’t feasible to carry on and be able to compete against bigger funded institutions. In addition, we have seen your feedback over the past few years, including our recent end of year survey and we recognise the limitations of our space is often brought up as an issue.”

Hope

There was, however, a positive note left by the team, who plan to keep the Emporium alive, but in a ‘different format’, with plans to develop a new space.

They shared: “Now the sad bit is said, here’s for a less sad note: TQE is going to continue in a different format. We’re collaborating with numerous venues throughout Cardiff to carry on our community events and gigs after we close so please look out for them. They will still be advertised on here and our website so please look out for them. Marm’s Spotlight and Queer Comedy will visit cities around Wales and the rest of the UK – if you’re not based in Cardiff, look out, we might be near you soon. We will also be doing pop ups at prides and other events so if you see us, please come and support us.

“We are also in talks to develop a new space – it’s larger, accessible and even has an outdoor space but it is away from the city centre. We’re still very far off from it being ready to be open for you but we will share more information on this as the wheels move on it.

“In the meantime, we will be here until late August 2026, so please still come and visit, attend events, buy items and support local queer businesses. Contrary to business advice, our entire team have been notified, because we want to make sure they have enough time to plan and find new jobs; this may mean that over the next few months, we might not be operating at full capacity, since we’re expecting team changes and help from people who may not be too familiar with the shop floor, so please bear with us!

“Please continue to support us over the coming months, it’s always lovely to see you all but we’d like to ask that we keep the chats to celebrating the past five years and cheerleading the team in their next ventures rather than anything too sad (trust me, we are all very gutted).”

Find out more about the Queer Emporium here.