About us

Queer U Stories (QUS) is the volunteer-driven initiative for the LGBTQIA+ history of the city of Utrecht in the Netherlands.

QUS stand for Queer Utrecht Stories - highlighting the diverse narratives of Utrecht’s rainbow communities - while also playing on the phrase queer your stories: inviting everyone to embrace their own queer stories. In Dutch, QUS is pronounced as “kus”, meaning “kiss”, symbolizing love and connection.

Activities

QUS inspires a diverse range of creative individuals—including theatre makers, visual artists, and musicians—to explore and engage with Utrecht’s rich queer history (see illustrations). The QUS team collaborates with various partners to shed light on this often-overlooked history.

Discover more through these suggestions (for additional details, click on the italicized text):

• Book: Utrechtenaren, een queer geschiedenis, available at bookstores and online from the publisher WBOOKS.
• Expo: een tentoonstelling in oktober 2024 in het Utrechtse stadhuis, in juni 2025 in het Utrechtse Provinciehuis en ook online te zien.
• Queer City Tour: Guided city walks for groups.
• Queer city map: A printed map featuring a queer history tour of Utrecht’s inner city. There is also a queer route available online via the Utrecht Time Machine.
• Presentations: the team tells stories about Utrecht's queer history on request. For example, listen to the podcast with Marijke Huisman and view the lecture by Maurice van Lieshout and Marijke Huisman.

Website

Thousands of people follow the developments on this website. Here you'll find events, people, and stories from Utrecht's LGBTQIA+ history. And info about us, our activities and products.

• Canon – timeline of Utrecht's queer history
• Utrechtenaren - portraits of queer live and activism
• Stories from Utrecht's queer history
• News van QUS
• Queer City Walk - walking through queer history in the Utrecht city center
• About us: our team, our book and our expo

Stay updated by signing up for our news service and following us on social media.

Follow us on social media

History QUS

When Kees Diepeveen took office as alderman for diversity in Utrecht in 2016, the Utrecht rainbow community introduced him to the queer history with a walk through the city. Diepeveen was so exited about it, that he provided funding for a project on queer history. The team started with the online rainbow canon that they launched on Coming Out Day 2021. What followed and continues is a wave of creative productions about the Utrecht’s queer history.