(Yes, that means avocado toast and mimosas served with a side of drag queens shaking their rumps.) Another festive Sunday scene is Hamburger Mary’s Sunday Broadway Brunch. Bar Boheme, a restaurant known for its frozen mojitos, creative pizzas, and Vietnamese fries, is well-known for its Sunday drag-show brunches on the massive wraparound patio. RIPCORD opened in 1980 and has the distinction of being the oldest gay leather bar in Texas. Less than five miles west downtown, Montrose features gayborhood staples like permanently installed rainbow crosswalks and historic saloons. By the ’80s, amid the HIV and AIDS epidemic, Montrose was known for being the hub of queer life in Houston. More than 1,000 people showed up, which began the gay liberation movement in Montrose and led Hill to help establish The Montrose Center, an organization still operating today that focuses not only on advocacy but also on offering resources to the community. In June of 1977, LGBTQ advocate Ray Hill organized a rally in protest of singer and anti-gay activist Anita Bryant visiting the city. The Montrose neighborhood in Houston was founded in 1911 and had an estimated 30 to 40 gay bars by the late ’70s. The marker sits at “ The Gay Crossroads,” located at the intersection of Throckmorton Street and Cedar Springs.Īsia O’Hara, a former contestant on RuPaul’s Drag Race, performing at The Rose Room on Cedar Springs Road in Dallas.
In 2018, Dallas became the first city in Texas with an official Texas Historical Commission subject marker acknowledging its longstanding queer community. The Oak Lawn neighborhood, located along Cedar Springs Road, has held the heart of the LGBTQ community in Dallas for over 30 years and is the primary assembly point for LGBTQ political and social events, including the annual Alan Ross Freedom Parade. As that group grew to over 3,000 while marching through downtown, Dallas became the site of the first gay pride parade in all of Texas. That emergence intensified in 1972, when three days after the Stonewall Riots, 300 activists took to the streets in the name of equality. In 1947, one of the first gay bars in Texas, Club Reno, opened in Dallas, heralding the city’s LGBTQ community as one of the earliest to form in the state. Their one-of-a-kind restaurants, vivacious nightclubs, and lovable locals crown these gayborhoods as attractive destinations-no matter where you fall on the sexuality spectrum. For decades, all types of people from cowboys to drag queens have lived, worked, and played harmoniously in these charming meccas of queer life.
Texas’ “gayborhoods” aren’t just neighborhoods with rainbow-painted crosswalks at their intersections they’re historic communities where Texas pride and gay pride intersect in ever-fascinating unison. But why stop at one? We’ve field-tested all these joints and many, many more, and we promise: Your home-away-from-home is here waiting for you with a chilling drink and welcoming smile.īy Jacob Vaughn, David Fletcher, Eva Raggio, Lauren Daniels and Observer staff and contributors.One of Oak Lawn’s two gateway signs sits at the intersection of Douglas Avenue and Cedar Springs Road, in Dallas, right in front of Kroger. The choices are endless, but we promise that somewhere on this list is a spot ready to welcome you as its newest regular. Rock the night away, check out a flight of North Texas’ fine craft brews and booze or soothe your stressed soul in a padded booth at a friendly neighborhood dive. Our favorite bars - listed alphabetically, not ranked - offer places to match your mood and personality. Whether you’re in the mood for light jazz and handcrafted cocktails, boot-scooting and a PBR or dressing to the nines and sipping a mixologist’s latest magic elixir, your next watering hole is ready for you in Big D. DFW’s best bars offer a bit of everything.Īre your pipes warmed up for a night of karaoke? Maybe you’re looking for a friendly spot to catch a game on a big-screen with pals. Sometimes you want to go where everybody knows your name, others you want a stout drink in a quiet corner.