The founders of Brooklyn's wildest club describe the craziest night out of their lives
- Artists Kae Burke and Anya Sapozhnikova are the founders of Brooklyn's wildest, weirdest club, House of Yes
- The duo got their start working and performing at now-legendary New York warehouse parties, Rubulad and The Danger
- Their craziest night out involved attending both warehouse parties and streaking, water balloons, a surprise marriage, and a trip to Coney Island
Kae Burke and Anya Sapozhnikova are veterans of the New York City nightlife scene, to put it mildly.
The two artists moved to New York over a decade ago as fresh-faced 19-year-olds and threw themselves into the colorful and strange Do-It-Yourself party and art scene that has dominated Brooklyn since the early 2000s.
Now they run the successful Brooklyn nightclub House of Yes, which they describe as "the weirdest nightclub possible." Party-goers encounter trance and house DJs, aerialists, circus performers, marching bands, burlesque dancers, magicians, and tarot card readers - often all on the same night.
House of Yes, in Burke's words, is place of "cartoon logic" where "anything is possible."
In their first years in the city, Burke and Sapozhnikova were underage. They weren't able to go out to bars or clubs and the only way they were allowed to go to parties was by working them.
At the time, the DIY-party scene was dominated by Rubulad, an underground warehouse party started in the early 1990s by artists Chris Thomas and Sari Rubinstein that Burke described as a disorienting place "where you have no idea what you are there for" and anything goes. Burke and Sapozhnikova got their start working at Rubulad.
At around the same time, the next generation of Brooklyn warehouse parties began, The Danger parties organized by Will Etundi.
The Danger parties, according to Untapped Cities, were a "throwback to '80s New York, where there were simply less rules." In the case of one party in 2010, that meant "a four floor warehouse party with hot tub, circus swings, art and film installations, and ten simultaneous live acts."
Burke and Sapozhnikova's craziest night in New York was when The Danger and Rubulad parties happened on the same night, and they decided to go to both.
The duo had recently lost their home, the first House of Yes, a rundown loft in Ridgewood, to a fire. Feeling mischievous because they hadn't been hired that night (they sometimes worked the parties), the two decided it was their mission to sabotage The Danger party.
They started the night by filling and tying enough water balloons to fill a garbage can, which they then hid from the party organizers.
They had also made a bunch of masks out of black and white stripes with the eyes cut out and put them in a cardboard box at the party. After a few hours at the party, they told all their friends to meet, put their clothes in the box, and put on the masks.
Burke said she ran through the party recruiting friends, acquaintances, and complete strangers to join her and Sapozhnikova's prank.
Over time, Burke said, "you develop this community of fellow people who party and work at parties and everyone is open."
Masked streakers - Burke and Sapozhnikova included -ran around the party naked disrupting the dancing partygoers and the performances. After it was over, the duo decided to head to Rubulad to see what was going on for a few minutes. They ended up staying until sunrise.
When they got back to The Danger, inebriated, they remembered the water balloons. After tracking the trash can down from the security guards, who had been moving it all night, they dragged it out to the yard where everyone still at the party was hanging out. Lots of the streakers were still naked.
Burke and Sapozhnikova began throwing the water balloons at the partygoers, who then joined in on the water balloon fight. Some began throwing other objects back at the duo.
"For a minute or two, there was this moment where the sky was full of objects flying through the air," Sapozhnikova said.
Then amidst the crowd, their friend Aaron Goldsmith decided that he needed to perform an impromptu marriage ceremony for Burke and Sapozhnikova.
The night (morning?) ended with the two getting on a train to swim in the ocean off Coney Island. By the time they got there at 10 AM, they were ready to go home.
"The journey there is more important than dancing in the waves," Burke said.
The sense of "vibrant play," spontaneity, and mischief is the essence of what Burke and Sapozhnikova try to offer at House of Yes, Sapozhnikova said.