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The party was at Sovereign House, a subterranean venue on the Lower East Side, right by Chinatown, in the neighborhood sometimes referred to as Dimes Square, a nightlife district that has also become a curious metonymy for a heterodox right-leaning scene. One sponsor of the event was Polymarket, an cryptocurrency-based online prediction market where people can bet on anything, including politics. The trucker hats were being given away by Remilia, the other co-host and sponsor, a group described by the magazine Dazed as an “anti-woke crypto community.”
The latter sponsor appeared to be a particularly large draw, dominating the party’s 500-person RSVP list. Remilia attendees were the most online people in the room: If you imagine a type of vaguely goth guy who spends a lot of time on 4chan, with an anime profile picture, who would also vote for Trump—you’re probably pretty close. But there were also several cute young women among them, too, still displaying an affinity for e-girl aesthetics: heavy winged eyeliner, choker necklaces, pleated mini skirts.
Few revelers were willing to speak for attribution. Many of those in attendance, Remilia, MAGA, or otherwise, are better (or only) known by their online personas. Some others, whose full names I know, still understandably did not want to be quoted. But several people, when they were told that I was there writing about the event for GQ, asked me if I wanted them to say a slur for the record.
Sovereign House has become the de-facto event space for anyone even marginally adjacent to this scene, or really anyone young and hip and in need of a place to throw a poetry reading or fashion show. According to the Christian Science Monitor, in a story about New York’s avant-garde religious conservatives, Sovereign House is a “a salon started by Nick Allen, a New York tech worker who wanted to create a space for more dissident Dimes Square artists. They host parties for newly launched magazines, stage new plays, and even just engage in conversations about art and literature. (The tech entrepreneur Peter Thiel has also helped fund an ‘antiwoke’ film festival in Manhattan.)”
The oddly placed parenthetical mention of Thiel, a right-wing billionaire and prominent supporter of the President-Elect, is something that has defined Sovereign House since it opened last year. As another writer recently wrote on Substack, Sovereign House is said to be backed by Thiel and the political writer Curtis Yarvin, both of whom are seen as arguably the biggest—yet quietest—players in the so-called “New Right.” Their involvement in Sovereign House is often spoken of as if it’s fact, but at least in terms of public record, it is largely speculation. On the other hand, Polymarket—one of the other sponsors of the party, is publicly known to be backed by Thiel, so the association is there either way.
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