Making Space at The Alcove in Providence
The new feminist cultural center firmly centers women, joy and a sense of community inside its well-appointed walls.
A book club room, designed with a distressed French apartment feel, anchors The Alcove’s second floor. Photography by Angel Tucker
By Dana Rae Laverty
There’s nothing exceptional about the built-in banquette tucked into the corner of The Alcove, the new feminist cultural center in Providence.
Until you sit in it.
“I’ve seen women sit on that bench, and they put their feet on the ground, and they go, ‘Oh!’ and then the tears come. I never realized how emotional it was for women to feel like they fit into furniture,” says Anne Holland, a founding board member.
Like most of the seating inside The Alcove, the banquette is scaled to fit women five feet, four inches tall. So when you sit in a chair, your feet don’t dangle. They find the flooring, and you feel like you belong. You fit.
That’s not accidental. The Alcove, which opened in January on Broadway, is a space for women and gender expansive people to form connections and community, with events and exhibits, a gallery and library space for members and nonmembers. Women played an integral role at every stage of the process to turn the one-story former religious supply store into a two-level community hub full of color, joy, connections and culture.
