LOVE IS BLIND
Call us romantic, but nothing beats
watching people show their hearts to the world on reality TV. But For all the
love, lust, and botched nosejobs, there’s no reality TV show that represents
us; gender non conforming, queer people, stuck on early 2000s aesthetics.
So we made own and it
even lasted 3 seasons. Introducing Love is Blind EU; Queers in Quarantine.
Much like the Netflix show, we invited people to make meaningful connections with others before revealing their face. But this time we made it queer accessible, bright, and all on Instagram.
︎KEEP SCROLLING TO SEE HOW IT ALL WENT DOWN︎
To get cuties on board, we had to lay a
pretty hot thirst trap- so we DIYed a commercial, shared it on our accounts and
on a local drag lockdown livestream to direct potential contestants to our
instagram and application.
Within three days we were able to cast our first season. Once casted, we gathered everyone in a Telegram chat with their chosen nicknames and let the games begin.
Each season lasted a week and played out in three phases:
First, players could only text each other, second, they could talk on the phone
Third came the proposals.
Unlike the original, people could propose to anyone they liked. There were no rules to who matches as long as everyone consents. If a proposal is accepted, our matches saw each other for the first time on instagram live.
We didn’t just want to spark romance, we wanted to build community. So daily we gathered for games like ‘never have I ever’ or a cheeky show and tell.
At the end of every day, our players served us the hot tea with juicy screenshots and video updates about their crushes. The players even found some, well, ‘creative loopholes’ to the no-selfie rules, like drawing their own nudes. All the saucy updates went on the feed for us, the hosts and committed viewers to gossip about.
After just one season we had loyal fans joining our instagram lives for aaaaall the deets. We even brought in an astrological advisor to explain how the stars may align.
This show may have started as a quarantine concept, but quickly became a way for the queer community to connect and uplift each other while many of us are locked in less savory situations due to covid.
So there you have it, we gamified the queer online dating experience, packaged it in a colorful instagram, and brought together the community in a time of mass isolation.
And we wouldn’t change a thing.
