Capital City Pride’s HerStory

What is Pride?

Since 1991, Capital City Pride has hosted the annual Pride festival in Washington State’s capital which draws nearly 15,000 people for a parade and festival in downtown Olympia. Pride serves as the annual watershed event for the LGBTQIA2S+ and allied communities, offering entertainment, a vibrant array of food, craft and community booths, a family fun area and the ever-popular Pride Parade. Perhaps more important than the all the rainbows, music and festivities, Pride is a weekend long gathering of friends and family, bringing us all together to celebrate our fabulous community.

Why here?

The Olympia-based Pride was the first small town festival to emerge beyond the relative safety of the big city of Seattle and plant roots in a little community, population  36,000 in 1991.  It’s no mistake that Capital City Pride was fostered in the liberal City of Olympia, nurtured by a progressive college called The Evergreen State College and organized by a legion of LGBTQIA2S+ community-based activists.  State workers also played a strong role through their unions by fighting for LGBTQIA2S+ rights and protections in the work place as well as building  LGBTQIA2S+ competent service practices.  Over the years, other Pride celebrations have emerged across the State in larger cities like Spokane and Tacoma, as well as smaller towns like Centralia and Aberdeen.     

What kind of an organization is it?

Capital City Pride is registered as a Washington state non-profit corporation and holds a combined state and City of Olympia business license. The Rainbow Community Center of Olympia serves as Pride’s fiscal sponsor.  Capital City Pride is a proud member of Interpride, the international association of Pride Organizers.  In addition to this website, Pride hosts a Facebook page.  Pride holds monthly business meetings and periodic community forums to draw in new people.  For more information, please see our “Connect” link on this website.

What has happened with Pride since the Pandemic?

Capital City Pride is undergoing new management since 2020 and is slowly turning into OLYWA PRIDE!!!! OLYWA PRIDE is a combinations of the old and new crew who have been slowly and steadily dedicating their time to creating collaborative arts, inclusion, creative content, queer expression and more. We recognize the needs of Queer Culture & Queer Community. It is most important to us to be able to express ourselves and also provide the safe spaces for those who need to be expressive!

We strive to give back to every Queer from the youth to the elders. We are all valid here in Olympia. We choose to create and share a loving space and city.