On September 5th, Art & Acceptance launched in a new version: out of doors on the St. Luke’s School playground! Keeping it safe and secure, we provide our guests with reusable masks & filters, as well as hand sanitizers for future use. We are thankful to our friend and neighbor Alexander Paykin, P.C., whose Law Office has donated high-quality hand sanitizers for us to distribute. This was especially appreciated in the early months of the pandemic, when small hand sanitizers were virtually impossible to find!

Our longterm volunteers have reunited to co-create fun, culturally competent, and now socially-distanced versions of the activities our guests know and love: arts activities and now art supplies to go, writing prompts and queer-themed lending library, and our beloved, stylish, free pop-up clothing shop. Alongside the usual arts and dinner activities that we have always hosted, the St. Luke’s School playground affords us lots of space to dance and double-dutch, as well as to play socially distanced versions of basketball. At the end of the month, we hope to revamp our Halloween Costume Catwalk, inaugurated by Youth Arts Specialist Sue Lopez last year and made possible by lots of diligent work by our awesome volunteers.

Guests mentioned that they appreciated the earlier hours, feeling safer during the pandemic traveling early, and we discussed how we can all continue to honor the need for safety and minimize risk.

Our guest attendance, while chill, guideline-abiding, and grateful to be here, has been low in numbers. During our monthly Community Meeting, held on Sep. 26, the topic of how to increase our numbers and our impact came up and was discussed among volunteers, staff, and guests. “I know there are folks out there who need these services,” one guest said. We are working on expanding outreach based on their suggestions. We realize it may take some time for news to travel to our guests that we are back up and running.

We are extremely grateful to our neighbors on Hudson Street for their support and understanding.

Last Saturday, one of the writing prompts were to write about “your perfect day.” One of our regular guests said that her perfect day was coming to Art & Acceptance! We can’t think of a greater gift than hearing that. We hope that soon enough we can reach every young person who needs a space like this.

If you’d like to learn more about Art & Acceptance, please write Simone at