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When Battle Hymn took place the Sunday before World Pride and insinuated it might not return for the biggest gay night in New York’s history, there was outcry. You can sit round and have a coffee here or you can pop across to Russ & Daughters mere moments away for a lox and schmear bagel and a coffee to go. BluestockingsĪ queer and feminist bookstore on the Lower East Side, Bluestockings has been a vital part of the intersectional feminist and LGBTQ+ scenes in New York for decades. It’s an area that rewards exploration: I once went to a disco in the back of a pasta shop and frequented a 24-hour party in which the poetry of Emily Dickinson was set to different genres of music.
#METROPOLITAN GAY BAR BROOKLYN NY PLUS#
The area contains exceptional restaurants – the original Roberta’s still serves up some of the city's best pizza here by the Morgan L stop, Momo Sushi Shack does some truly incredible Japanese food, plus Bushwick's Latinx community continue to offer up some of the East Coast's best Mexican dishes, including the Tortilleria Mexicana Los Hermanos tortilla factory by Johnson Avenue and Taqueria Sofia on Suydam (arguably the best El Pastor in New York.) Then there’s the great bars, including the kitsch and expansive The Johnson's (with a very generous happy hour) and the vintage shopping to be found at L Train vintage and the local Beacon's Closet. I used to live here in the Loom building, with performance artists and drag queens and musicians, where the lofts were always parties, the rooftops constantly heaving with bodies and the cafe downstairs riddled with old flames.
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Bushwig, the city’s iconic drag fest, is named after the area it started in.
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One of Brooklyn’s most fascinating neighbourhoods, Bushwick has been a vital part of the city’s LGBTQ+ scene for years. New York offers this in spades, though it's important to be mindful to how the city functions: remember to bring tips for the bar and for your performers, respect the space you are in and who it was made for, and remember that you are being invited into a beautiful and delicate domestic ecosystem. Travel as an LGBT person is hard and it's even harder to find a place where you're not only welcomed, but you can have a damn good time with your community. New York Pride was a great reminder that, though it can sometimes be too slick and too expensive to be as punk as you'd like it to be, there are few cities in the world where it's better to be a faggot. Pride can be tough - what is it to be proud of oneself? What is it to be proud of where we are as a community? – but it is also a great reminder of the love, lust and sheer joie de vivre that keeps us going. New York was the first place I ever went to pride and at the time I didn’t appreciate it I was too obsessed with the idea that other queer people didn’t want me to belong and in too transient a point in my life to put in the work on being a better member of my community.