Lesbian and Gay Cultural Centre Frankfurt am Main

The Lesbisch-Schwules Kulturhaus (LSKH) (Lesbian and Gay Cultural Centre) in Frankfurt am Main is one of the first institutional centres for lesbian and gay culture in Germany. The association Lebendiges Lesben Leben e. V. (LLL, Living Lesbian Life) initiated the founding of the centre with the aim of promoting education, exchange and counselling in the field of women’s living contexts and, at the same time, of breaking down exclusion and prejudice against lesbians. In its general educational work on homosexuality, the LSKH also understands itself as a mediator of the insight that homosexual and heterosexual feelings and behaviour are equally valid expressions of the one human sexuality. The Lesbisch-Schwules Kulturhaus is a nationally known space for communication and action for the LGBT movement. Today it is called LSKH Queeres Kulturhaus Frankfurt.

History and founding

Within the expanding new women’s movement, the lesbian-queer emancipation movement also took shape in the early 1970s with its own groupings oriented towards sexual identities, initially in the political centres of Berlin and Frankfurt am Main. From 1972 onwards, activists from the lesbian and gay movement met for annual international Lesbian Whitsun Meetings (Lesbenpfingsttreffen) in order to foster communication and community among women and to break down prejudices about female/lesbian ways of life. They were substantially involved in the founding of many women’s projects and women’s centres and in political action alliances; the socio-political demands and themes of the new women’s movement are closely bound up with the history of the lesbian and gay movement.¹

As early as 1971 the women’s/lesbian bar La Gata, privately run, opened in Frankfurt-Sachsenhausen. The scene club became internationally known and is regarded as one of the first venues of lesbian subculture worldwide. Its founder Erika Wild was nominated in 2020 for the Hessischer Preis für Lesbische Sichtbarkeit (Hessian Prize for Lesbian Visibility), awarded by the Hessisches Ministerium für Soziales und Integration (Hessian Ministry for Social Affairs and Integration), and was honoured with the prize in 2022.²³⁴ In February 2026 it became known that La Gata has to vacate its premises in Seehofstraße because the landlord intends to terminate the lease. Private supporters, but also Frankfurt local politicians, are campaigning for the bar to be preserved.⁵

Out of the women’s movement active both locally and nationally in Frankfurt am Main, an informal lesbian group emerged in 1973 from the circle of the second Frankfurter Weiberrat.⁶ At the same time, activists opened the first women’s centre in Eckenheimer Landstraße, organised along autonomous, grassroots-democratic lines. In 1976 numerous women’s institutions came into being which campaigned jointly for the interests of lesbian women (among other things for social equality and for making experiences of violence and discrimination public). Thus the first lesbian centre was created at Kiesstraße 16, the women’s bookshop at Kiesstraße 27, a women’s meeting point with a café in a squatted house at Niedenau 51, a women’s cultural centre at Oppenheimer Landstraße 40, and the association Frauen helfen Frauen e. V. (Women Help Women). In 1977 a second women’s centre followed at Landgrafenstraße 13 as well as a women’s café at Neuhofstraße 39. In the field of culture and media, the Frankfurter Frauenblatt appeared from 1978 onwards; in the same year the Feminist Women’s Health Centre opened as the second autonomous institution of its kind nationwide, and further women’s centres followed in Frankfurt am Main. In their work, all of these projects also engaged with the subject of lesbian ways of life and identities.

The first institutional facility by and for lesbian women to be funded from public money was opened in Frankfurt am Main in 1991. In 1989 the initiators had founded the association Lebendiges Lesben Leben e. V. – Zentrum für Kommunikation, Kultur, Bildung, Beratung und Lebenshilfe e. V. (LLL, Living Lesbian Life – Centre for Communication, Culture, Education, Counselling and Life Support) with the aim of creating a space for the psychosocial counselling of lesbian women, of providing information about female homosexuality and of breaking down prejudices about lesbians. At the same time the centre was to develop programmes in the field of art and culture. The undertaking was supported by the Women’s Department of the City of Frankfurt am Main, likewise newly established in 1989, as well as by the then SPD Lord Mayor Volker Hauff.⁷⁸⁹

Site of the Lesbisch-Schwules Kulturhaus, Klingerstraße 6, Frankfurt am Main
Foto: Karin Kraus

The meeting place and forum for discussing the planning of a lesbian centre for culture, education and counselling in the city were the monthly so-called lesbenpolitische Mittwoche (lesbian-political Wednesdays) at the Frankfurter Frauenschule.¹⁰ After the question of whether a lesbian cultural centre should be built up independently and autonomously, or with which cooperation partners, had been debated intensively, the Lesbisch-Schwules Kulturhaus (LSKH) was established in 1991 under joint sponsorship with gay men from the association Emanzipation e. V. In 2013 Emanzipation e. V. dissolved itself; since then the association LLL has been the sole sponsoring body.

After the opening, the premises of the LSKH, in particular the larger event rooms, on the property at Klingerstraße 6/Stoltzestraße 11 were further developed and renovated through voluntary work by the sponsoring associations. During this period the cultural work was initially carried out at other venues, for instance at the Gallustheater, in rooms of Frankfurter Saalbau GmbH and of the University of Frankfurt, at street festivals and at cultural events with lesbian and gay artists. With their cultural-political work, both sponsoring associations connected the opportunity to enter into a constructive dialogue with the population as a whole about homosexuality and about the ways of life of lesbian and gay people.

Archive and counselling centre

Since its founding, the association LLL has run the Lesbenarchiv (Lesbian Archive) in the LSKH, which houses an extensive collection on the lesbian movement in Frankfurt am Main and the region. The holdings now comprise around 4,700 books, some 100 feminist, women’s and lesbian magazines, numerous posters, audio and visual media and grey literature (as of 2021). The entire collection is catalogued in the Dachverband deutschsprachiger Lesben-/Frauenarchive, -bibliotheken und -dokumentationsstellen (ida) (umbrella association of German-language lesbian/women’s archives, libraries and documentation centres); it is available for research and enquiries and can in part be borrowed. The archive is continuously expanded on a voluntary basis.¹¹

In 1992 the Lesben Informations- und Beratungsstelle e. V. (LIBS, Lesbian Information and Counselling Centre) was founded within the association LLL. Since then LIBS has worked independently as a counselling, drop-in and information centre for lesbian and bisexual women and girls.

Services, activities and cooperations of the LSKH

The Lesbisch-Schwules Kulturhaus understands itself as a central space for communication and action for lesbians, gay men, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex and asexual people (LGBTQIA+) and interested fellow citizens in the city.¹²

The centre is used on their own initiative as a meeting place and event space by various groups and associations, by self-help groups and by politically and socially motivated groups. The women’s choir Die Liederlichen Lesben, founded in 1993, for example uses the house as a rehearsal room.

In addition, the LSKH organises events such as concerts, readings, discussions, exhibitions, film screenings and theatre performances. Regular fixtures include the LesCafé held on Sundays with lectures, workshops and tea dances, the lesbian parties, the annual New Year’s Eve party, the lesbian and gay reading night during the Frankfurt Book Fair, and a book stall at the Christopher Street Day (CSD) held annually in Frankfurt am Main.¹³

In 2019/2020 the LSKH organised the event series Queere Generationendialoge (Queer Generational Dialogues) on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the events at the Stonewall Inn in New York. In various programme formats, the histories of emancipation and recognition of LGBTQIA+ people in the local and regional area were presented and discussed in cross-generational conversations.

Political actions

In 1976 the Frauenzentrum (women’s centre), the Lesbenzentrum (lesbian centre) and the Frauentreffpunkt Niedenau (Niedenau women’s meeting point) organised the night-time demonstration Gewalt gegen Lesben (Violence against Lesbians) in Frankfurt am Main. In a joint statement the activists demanded the acquittal of two homosexual women who had been charged with causing bodily harm resulting in death. At night the couple had defended themselves against the repeated importunities of a man: “Criminal are all men who threaten women in any way. We do not recognise any men’s justice whose law is injustice against women.”¹⁴

In 1998 the exhibition AIDS und Kunst (AIDS and Art), showing artistic works by HIV and AIDS patients and their relatives, took place at the LSKH in cooperation with the Frankfurt AIDS hospice association die insel, which is part of the hospice movement.¹⁵

In 2012 the Schwul-lesbische Aktionstage vor dem CSD zu Rassismus, neuen Familien und alten Tabus (Gay and lesbian days of action before the CSD on racism, new families and old taboos) were held at the LSKH. The programme in the run-up to the CSD was developed by the grouping Schrägstrich, in which lesbian groups in particular work together, as a critical alternative to what they saw as the overly commercial and unpolitical emphasis of the CSD. In 2014 as well, the lesbian counselling centre LIBS e. V. and the women’s council of the Faculty of Social Sciences of the Goethe University Frankfurt organised an alternative CSD in Frankfurt am Main.¹⁶¹⁷

Organisation and funding

In the first year the two sponsoring associations received start-up funding, primarily earmarked for cultural events, from the Department for Science and Art in cooperation with the Department for Social Affairs and Women of the City of Frankfurt am Main. In their cultural-political work the two sponsoring associations developed outreach programmes in order to enter into a constructive dialogue with the population as a whole about homosexuality and about the ways of life of lesbian and gay people. Since 1990 the Lesbenarchiv has also been funded with municipal money.¹⁸

Even by its 10th anniversary the LSKH was well used; as early as 1991 it was being used by around 30 groups and associations, among them the leisure group GayArt, a group of lesbian foreign women, the Frankfurter Volleyball Verein, one of the largest German gay sports clubs, the group of deaf lesbians and gay men, the Regenbogen-Römer, an association of lesbians and gay men working for the Frankfurt city administration, and the Völklinger Kreis – Bundesverband schwuler Führungskräfte (federal association of gay executives).¹⁹

The association LLL and the LSKH are funded by the Office for Multicultural Affairs of the City of Frankfurt am Main (as of 2021). They also finance themselves through membership fees, donations and income from events.

Founders, board members and staff

The founders, board members and staff include, among others, Mahide Lein (co-founder of the Frauentreff, of the first lesbian centre in 1976 and of the women’s bookshop), Hannelise Richter (LLL e. V.), Stefan Buss (Emanzipation e. V.),²⁰ Andreas Laeuen (Emanzipation e. V.), Jean-Luc Vey (Emanzipation e. V.).²¹

The board currently (2021) consists of the following people: Ruth Welk, Friederike Boll, Christine Fritz.²²

External links

Website of the Lesbisch-Schwules Kulturhaus Frankfurt am Main
Website of the Integration and Diversity Portal of the City of Frankfurt am Main
Website of the Lesbenarchiv Frankfurt

Machine translation: This article was translated automatically from the German original.

1
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16
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17
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22
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