For a second year, Aspen Meadows Resort will honor Juneteenth on Sunday with a showcase of Black chefs and wine professionals and a musical tribute to 50 years of hip hop.
The event includes food from award-winning chefs like Erick Williams, Damarr Brown, and Gregory Gourdet and JJ Johnson, as well as Aspen’s own Mawa McQueen.
And sommelier Tahiirah Habibi is curating the wine selection; she’s the founder of the Hue Society, an organization that focuses on Black, brown and Indigenous representation and access in the wine industry.
Kaya Williams spoke with Habibi about inclusion, community and the “revolutionary” practice of joy in advance of this weekend’s Juneteenth event, which falls on the last day of the Food and Wine Classic in Aspen.
The event at Aspen Meadows runs from 1:30 to 4:30 p.m. on Sunday, and tickets are $125 dollars. The official federal holiday for Juneteenth is on Monday, commemorating the emancipation of enslaved people in the United States.
I don't believe in begging for seats at tables which weren't built for me. So I will leap over the table, go find some of my own wood and build it, and I think that's what we're doing here.Sommelier Tahiirah Habibi, on advocating for representation and access in the wine industry
Kaya Williams: The Wine and Culture Festival in Atlanta, which you are very involved in, it looks at the wine industry and the cultural experience of wine through a black lens. I'd love for you to start by explaining kind of what that means to you.
Tahiirah Habibi: I think it really just means authenticity. A lot of times, we are pushed into other cultures and expected to assimilate and adjust to everyone else, and I think that we deserve luxury experiences just as ourselves.
And so through music that we love, the food that we love — the foods that we enjoy and that nourish us at home should be honored. And also through art, you know. I think that those things are important, but they're never really prevalent in a lot of this space, especially the wine space.
Williams: Speaking of that wine space, how would you describe the conventional field, when you're not in a place that's focused on inclusion? What does it normally feel like to be in one of these spaces for you?
Habibi: It feels kind of tight and uncomfortable a lot of times because, being underrepresented, you're going into a space, and we are humans, and so we look for our likeness, and everything. When you are in positions of disenfranchised communities, you're immediately looking for someone else who looks like you, that's going to help with that comfort level of just being kind of outside of your own zone.
A lot of these spaces are not built for us. They're built for the comfort of whiteness, because that's what the whole space have historically been. It can take your breath away a lot, and you do kind of try to find your — I want to say allies, but you do try to find people who make you feel safe.
There's a level of psychological safety that is missing in a lot of these spaces, because of the expectations of how you're supposed to show up or present, versus who you may really be, and how far or not that representation is going to
get you.
Williams: So then to be in a space where you see a lot of other people that look like you and that's celebrated, what does that feel like?
Habibi: That feels like home. I don't think that people talk enough about psychological safety, but that feels like home. It feels like you can breathe, and it’s just the opposite of what I was saying. It's just like, when you walk into your own home, and you are in your pajamas, and you're just enjoying yourself. That's what that feels like. It's an incredible — it's very encompassing, it feels supportive, and it feels inclusive, right, but authentic. That's always the theme there is the authenticity.
Williams: Now one of the core values that's listed on the Hue Society website is “to create change through revolutionary practices.” Can you tell me a little bit about what kinds of practices those might be that really affect change?
Habibi: Joy is a revolutionary practice. You know, it's consistently trying to be stripped from us on a regular basis since we got into this country. And to hold on to that to find joy and all the things that you are consistently dealing with is revolutionary.
Community is revolutionary. You try to tear communities apart, and when you have a strong foundation in that, that's really important.
Doing things our way through our lens, right? Like, that's revolutionary when you're in an industry that is consistently telling you, ‘you have to look like this, we have to sound like this, you have to have this certification, you have to do all of these things,’ versus being able to carve your own path or do things your way. And then the industry also still pushes you towards being a winemaker or a somm.
So, you know, moving into these other paths and doing it your way is revolutionary for underrepresented groups. Those are revolutionary things. Every time you show up as yourself, you reclaim parts of yourself that the world is consistently chipping away at.
Williams: And looking forward to this weekend, what are you excited about? What are you looking forward to coming here?
Habibi: So the last time I was in Aspen was 2015. So I'm really excited to see how it's changed. I did hear about all the amazing Black and multicultural events last year, which was not there when I was there, I can tell you that.
I really love working with the Salamander [Hotels and Resorts] family [that manages Aspen Meadows], and I love the direction in which they're taking the company and how they're very proactive and intentional about creating a space in which people feel safe and loved and seen and heard.
So I'm really looking forward to putting on these events, and participating with the chefs and celebrating Juneteenth in a very authentic way, and just seeing my colleagues and my comrades from around the country, and hopefully continuing to open the door and build upon what's really tracking right now in Aspen and that gatekeeping — hopping over that gate.
I don't believe in begging for seats at tables which weren't built for me. So you know, I will leap over the table, go find some of my own wood and build it, and I think that's what we're doing here.
This interview has been edited and condensed. For more information about Aspen Meadows’ Juneteenth celebration, visit aspenmeadows.com.
