Breaking Bread as a Strategy for Resilience: Iowa House

With Iowa House, Jade Swayne and Amanda Madden sought to create a space that felt like home for queer and trans folk. Since September 2021, the couple have been opening their home for potluck dinners, drag show nights and to facilitative conversations. As a queer- and trans-centered but not queer- and trans-exclusive space, Iowa House lays a joy-focused foundation of collaboration and vulnerability.

“The community has granted us the opportunity to be facilitators while acknowledging that we might not show up 100% every time,” Swayne says. “That … is a strategy for resilience; if we can practice being together in the fluid nature of our experiences, so much more is possible.” “Being together” takes many forms, and Swayne and Madden have found that joy lies in the endless approaches to community care.

“We see the common thread between all of us as being [that] we’re all trying to do something that is intergenerational, multiracial, kind and healing to the environment in all that we do.”

Some queer folks are ostracized from their families after coming out and can lose a sense of home and community. Not only that, but “for queer people especially, we have to perform in many spaces for the sake of safety,” Swayne says. Acting outside of heteronormative societal expectations can become a safety risk. Iowa House is a place where all types of queer existence are celebrated. “People don’t have to perform a version of themselves here. They can really be their whole, full self in this space. Welcoming people in their wholeness feels so important,” Madden says. People can also use that supportive platform to explore other aspects of their identity or discuss more vulnerable topics.

Near-weekly potluck dinners are hosted either inside or in the backyard, depending on the weather. The type of food each person brings is not planned, and sometimes the group eats together at one long table or buffet style. “Sometimes we have a beautiful meal of soups and salads and dishes, or there’s the occasional night when it’s a bowl of gummy snacks,” Madden says. The sense of home and belonging is steadfast. The collective mood and attendance determine the food, conversational theme and activities of the evening. Madden has observed a new person coming to dinner every week, indicative of the valley’s vast and self-sustaining queer community.

Madden and Swayne identify a strong relationship between emotional nourishment via community conversations and physical nourishment from food. “It’s about being bodies together and really valuing body wisdom. If we can care for our bodies and each other’s bodies and offer support and space for that, that might be the beginning of changing everything,” says Madden. Attendees are asking larger questions about how they can nourish one another on magnitudes greater than the meal itself.

“… if we can practice being together in the fluid nature of our experiences, so much more is possible.”

This approach extends past the dinner meetings. Iowa House works alongside local grassroots organizations such as Unidxs, Nuanua Collective, Burning Sissy Valley, Mobile Moon Coop and Black, Bold & Brilliant SLC. “We see the common thread between all of us as being [that] we’re all trying to do something that is intergenerational, multiracial, kind and healing to the environment in all that we do,” Swayne says.

Iowa House asks those interested in learning more or in attending their gatherings to read the Letter to the Community on the Iowa House Instagram page @iowahouseSLC, which is the best way to stay up to date on weekly potlucks and other events.

Read more on community building:
Unidxs: Existing and Celebrating Without Resistance
Creating Community at Strength in Shades