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It turns out that Portland won't be getting it's first BDSM coffee shop, after all—at least, not the one we thought we'd get.
Back in July 2016, WW reported that the Moonfyre Cafe, planned to be open by last September the Catalyst space on SE Foster Road, which bills itself as "Portland's place for sex-positive events and education," and hosts classes on orgies and gang-bangs.
Though it seemed to never have an official opening day, the coffee shop was open for events held by Mistress Pixie Fyre, the founder of Portland's Fetish Night and the Moonfyre Cafe.
Related: We Took a Polyamory 101 Class at a Local S&M Cafe. Here's What We Learned.
But Pixie Fyre says the cafe was never officially open—and has vacated the space where it was planning on opening.
In a post in an online forum, DJ Kronos, one of the owners of Catalyst, announced the termination of any collaboration with Moonfyre Cafe.
The statement reads:
DJ Kronos says the original agreement was that Fyre was going to sublease part of the space, but that she didn't pay rent the entire 14 months the Moonfyre materials occupied the space.
But Fyre says that wasn't the agreement. In lieu of rent, she says, Moonfyre was paying Catalyst half their door fees, which, combined with the costs of renovations, often came out to $2800—which was more than their $2400 rent.
"They were out of money. My investment was to go and provide furniture and equipment and renovations to the space," she says. "I was paying them 50% of my door; the change in the agreement is I would continue to give them renovations to a space that was dangerous and not up to code."
She also says that despite Catalyst's statement, they weren't providing supplies for the parties.
Kronos says he didn't push Fyre to pay rent because he, "wanted to believe this collaboration could happen and believed it could be a good thing for the community."
He says that when they made the agreement, she had originally planned to be open by spring of 2016.
Fyre says the delays were caused by the need for significant repairs and upgrades to the building space, and that the cafe's opening was further delayed after she received a diagnosis of breast cancer at the end of 2016.
She also says that when Catalyst terminated the agreement, Moonfyre had already paid $12,000 on improvements to the building, and that Catalyst needlessly moved up her planned opening date a month early, to April 1 of this year.
"The response back was less than professional," she says. "It involved name-calling and they said we needed to come down and remove our belongings."
Fyre says she brought a "small team" to remove the equipment and belongings, because she wanted to make sure it was done professionally and swiftly.
"We left $11,000 of renovations in the space," she says. "We reached a point where they threatened to pull the rug out from under me and behave in a way we didn't feel was ethical. In any other kind of abusive relationship, you pull yourself together and get your exit plan together safely."
Kronos says that Catalyst apologizes to the communities "for the issues and the drama."
"Catalyst isn't going anywhere," he says. "We've already received a lot of feedback that basically people weren't coming because [Pixie Fyre] was involved, and we'll continue to do what we do offer sex positive events and education."