U-HaulXGarden

Club U-Haul is a club created by three friends, Wekesa, Trabelsi, and Suinner. Wekesa is a well-known DJ and dancer who has contributed to the Helsinki club scene by producing events like Mellow Yellow Club and Club U-Haul. Meriam Trabelsi and Caroline Suinner form The Soft Collective, dedicated to improving cultural spaces and evoking and processing emotions through music, combining practices of MCing and hosting.

Club U-Haul’s mission is to serve its community and celebrate brown and black queer culture. It emerged from two needs: to hear amapiano music and to have a lesbian club experience. Club U-Haul is a request to commit to good vibes, safer party spaces and to revolutionary dancefloors. The collective encourages people to mind the space they take if they attend the collective’s events outside of marginalized identities.

DJ Wekesa is a well-known DJ and dancer from Helsinki who plays amapiano, afrobeats, dancehall, hip hop, R&B and queer anthems. Wekesa is a socially skillful DJ who can read the dancefloor while serving surprises and their own strong artistic view. They have worked for over 10 years in the dancehall scene, bringing the music and culture to Helsinki and Finland. Throughout their DJ career, they have given their input for safer space practices of the Helsinki club scene by producing events like Mellow Yellow Club and Club U-Haul.

Caroline Suinner is an interdisciplinary artist known for projects concentrating on intersectionality and representation. Suinner’s career covers performance and visual art projects that have the examination of safety at their core. Suinner is working on accepting imperfections and creating balance in the chaotic reality.

Meriam Trabelsi, (she/they) is a multidisciplinary artist, a cultural worker and an MC based in Helsinki. Investigating and working with the experiences of safety has been at the core of their work with Club U-Haul, for example. Trabelsi is passionate about BIPOC queer liberation and joy, a good phat beat and astrology. Their newfound and long-overdue passion for DJing is keeping them inspired and challenged and they can’t wait to grow with this love. On the dancefloor, you can most likely find them in the middle of the cypher, shaking their booty.