Where is the best gayborhood for travelers?
It's all good in the gayborhood!
Mark
Every LGBTQ+ traveler knows a “gayborhood” isn’t just a street with a lot of gay bars — it’s a physical expression of the queer community’s joy, history, and safety, especially when you’re visiting somewhere new.
As part of this year’s Best of GayCities, we provided readers with a list of some of our favorites across the world and asked them to pick the very best.
What we learned was that while everyone had their different intricacies behind ranking No. 1, we were all guided by the same idea: The best way to understand a city is to acquaint oneself with its gayborhood.
I’m partial to Hell’s Kitchen in New York City, mostly its size and variety means you can find whatever vibe you’re looking for, any night of the week.
-Carson Mlnarik, Best of GayCities editorial board
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Below, the best gayborhoods for travelers, according to GayCities readers…
The winners
The top gayborhood was a tie between London‘s Soho and Hell’s Kitchen in New York City, both must-see areas when visiting either of the metropolitan destinations.
While both Soho and Hell’s Kitchen are local go-to’s and the types of neighborhoods you can venture into and meet LGBTQ+ people, they offer slightly contrasting vibes.
With institutions like Comptons, Soho (which attracts a diverse crowd across the rainbow) is more rooted in London’s original queer history than the gay male-led charge of Hell’s Kitchen, which has blossomed over the past two decades. (That said, you’d be hard pressed to find a better Friday night drag show than Hardware.)
Naturally, both are not far from their cities’ art and shopping scenes, which should be a gayborhood given.
The runners-up
Our silver goes to Wilton Manors in Fort Lauderdale, which took 13% of the vote. This small but mighty enclave, which was immortalized in 1996’s The Birdcage, consists of a walkable strip of LGBTQ+-owned shops, bars, and cafes, friendly locals, and enough frozen drinks to plan an itinerary around. Plus, it’s home to some of the southeast’s best gay nightlife and the World AIDS Museum and Educational Center.
Our third place was a three-way tie between The Castro in San Francisco; West Hollywood in Los Angeles; and Le Marais, Paris. The former helped define our very idea of “gayborhood,” as the district where Harvey Milk made history, Looking was filmed, and queer men and women were celebrating before it was trendy. On the other hand, WeHo holds The Abbey, an icon in its own right, and Le Marais is perhaps the most stylish gayborhood on this list.
The honorable mentions
One respondent put it best when they said, “You cannot limit it to just one place.”
These gayborhoods didn’t cinch a spot in the top 3, but we’ve got to shout them out for being well-known spots where we can hang — and love out loud.
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