Lavender Menace

Past Shelves: Histories of Queer Reading (Exhibition)
2026-03-05 10:00 - 2026-09-20 17:00 (Europe/London) | Museum of Edinburgh, 142-146 Canongate, Edinburgh, Midlothian, EH8 8DD, United Kingdom
We are delighted that a portion of the exhibition has been extended to 20 September 2026! You can find Past Shelves in the Huntly Room and Costume Gallery, on the first floor of the Museum.

Opening hours: During the summer, the Museum is open 7 days a week, 10am-5pm.

Join us for the Past Shelves exhibition to explore the impact of LGBTQ+ reading, publishing, and bookselling. The exhibition is inspired by Scotland’s first LGBTQ+ bookshops and LGBTQ+ community experiences in Scotland from 1980-2000.

The Past Shelves exhibition follows on from the Past Shelves oral history project run in 2025-2026 by the Lavender Menace Queer Books Archive.

Lavender Menace was Scotland’s first gay and lesbian community bookshop. Co-founded by Bob Orr and Sigrid Nielsen, it opened in 1982. After five years of bookselling, the bookshop was reborn as West & Wilde (1987-1997) owned by Bob Orr and Raymond Rose. These spaces were a haven for LGBTQ+ people and sold queer books at a time when mainstream bookshops would not stock them. The bookshops were also important community spaces where LGBTQ+ people could feel welcomed and connect with each other. In 2019, Lavender Menace was revived as Lavender Menace Queer Books Archive.

Discover the world of Lavender Menace and West & Wilde with us, through books, magazines, interviews and more.

Note: The exhibition originally included three sections. Two of the original sections have been extended to 20 September, you can find these in the Huntly Room and Costume Gallery.

Credits

This exhibition was created by Lavender Menace Queer Books Archive in partnership with Museums & Galleries Edinburgh. Thank you to our funders, the National Lottery Heritage Fund and Awards for All.

Location & access

The exhibition takes place at the Museum of Edinburgh, 142-146 Canongate, Edinburgh EH8 8DD.

The main entrance has 1 step. There is no lift and no ramp and the upper levels are accessible by stairs only. The exhibition is located on the first floor, accessible by stairs only.

We appreciate that this means some of our audience won’t be able to access the exhibition, and we are producing a digital guide of the exhibition in order to make the exhibition more accessible. You can also view this film of the exhibition to visit virtually.

If the inaccessibility of the building is preventing you from seeing the exhibition, please email themenaces@lavendermenace.org.uk and we will send you the digital guide when it is available.

Dyke's Delight: Kate Charlesworth in Conversation with Jay Whittaker
2026-03-13 14:00 - 15:30 | Assembly Rooms, 54 George Street, Edinburgh, EH2 2LR, United Kingdom
Join Lavender Menace for an afternoon of stories of lesbian life and art. Kate Charlesworth is an illustrator and writer of renowned lesbian cult classics like Sensible Footwear: A Girl’s Guide and The Life & Times of Auntie Studs. Kate will be in conversation with award-winning poet and writer Jay Whittaker.

Book ticket

This event is part of our exhibition Past Shelves: Queer Histories of Reading (5 March to 30 April, Museum of Edinburgh), created in partnership with the Museum of Edinburgh (City of Edinburgh Council). Thank you to our funders, National Lottery Heritage Fund and Awards for All.

Kate Charlesworth began to work as a cartoonist and illustrator in the 1970s. Her work has appeared in LGBT publications such as The Pink Paper, Gay News, Strip AIDS, Dyke’s Delight, whilst in the mainstream media she drew weekly strips for The Guardian, New Scientist, and the Independent. The award-winning graphic novel ‘Sally Heathcote – Suffragette’, co-authored with Mary and Bryan Talbot, appeared in 2014 and was followed in 2019 by her award-winning LGBT memoir/history, ‘Sensible Footwear – a Girl’s Guide.’

Jay Whittaker is an award-winning poet, author of two full length collections: Sweet Anaesthetist, (Cinnamon Press, 2020) and Wristwatch, (Cinnamon Press, 2017), which was Saltire Society Poetry Book of the Year 2018. Current projects include her third poetry collection, a queer sewing memoir in prose, and co-hosting EH11’s grass-roots poetry night, The Graveyard Shift.

(Photo by Ryan McGoverne)

Location and Access

This event is taking place at Assembly Rooms, 54 George Street, Edinburgh EH2 2LR.

The venue is fully accessible on the ground and first floor areas for all visitors with mobility difficulties and accessibility needs via a lift or handrail assistance. For full accessibility information, visit the venue website: https://cultureedinburgh.com/our-venues/assembly-rooms
