There has to be change. Intentional, progressive, actionable change.

In summer of 2019, after fruitlessly searching for a new local LARP to participate in, our founder Lawrence became frustrated with the lack of available options there were that provided representation for PoC and LGBTQ+ voices in the Atlanta LARP community. This was especially distressing, considering several of his friends, local game organizers, were willing to put in the effort to be more diverse and provide representation for marginalized communities, but had no resources to do so, especially no low-cost or free options.

After a frustrating experience trying to find resources to offer the local community, Lawrence created a Facebook page called Colored Worlds, for the purpose of providing general advice on diversity and representation to fantasy storytellers. After a few shares, the page grew to 300 followers in a single afternoon. For the following weeks, Lawrence ran this page alone for the next year, while also cultivating a small list of diversity consultants that could help worldbuilders practice more diverse habits, and do sensitivity readings. After a few weeks, the page was renamed LARPing In Color.

Someone has to do the work.

Despite the intent, there was simply too much work to do, and Lawrence quickly realized that the need for more resources and lack of availability was more than he could handle alone. Additionally, he wanted to support the position that emotional labor deserves to be paid for, but few games could afford to pay for diversity consulting.

With all this in mind, and the support of the growing amount of followers on Facebook, Lawrence reached out to some friends, and asked them to come onboard to help grow LINC into non-profit consulting organization. Chris and Jeanette, both of whom were consultants from the original list Lawrence built joined as part of the Board of Directors, and Ashley helped to round out our leadership team. Paperwork was filed in November 2020.

A Patreon page was started in September to help cover initial business costs, as well as to help fund a grant program to help game organizers pay for diversity consulting. Chris stepped into a role as Chief Editor, helping to manage and create our content, while Jeanette began acting as Chief Operating Officer, ensuring that we meet our goals. Ashley continues to help us focus on strategy, while Lawrence provides our vision and direction, while keeping the core of our mission intact: connecting game organizers with diversity consultants.

Raising the bar, and setting the standard.

Along the way, we’ve had help from some incredible people, such as Halden, a trusted friend who helped us organize and manage our finances while we build the groundwork of LINC, Tashina, who led our rebranding efforts, and of course, our patrons and donors who keep us functioning as a business entity.

With the foundation of our organization in place, we move to focus on bringing diversity to our favorite hobbies. We strongly believe that this is the first step to making LARP, Tabletop, and other forms of interactive storytelling a little more diverse, inclusive, and much more colorful. We’ve also expanded to providing resources and content for disabled individuals as well.

Now that our organization has the groundwork to be successful, the hard part begins. We can’t possibly reach every LARPer, roleplayer, or world-builder across the globe, but we can make access to resources for diversity a little easier. Together, we can make our hobbies a little (or a lot) more inclusive, and all it takes is a moment of your day to share our message.