Riding the New
WAVE DTLA’s pink triangle—the fresh batch of gay bars including Precinct, Redline and, soon, Bar Mattachine—has brought LGBTs out of the woodwork, ready to party in the city’s most booming neighborhood By Drew Mackie | Photography by Ryan Forbes
ow does this sound for a Friday night plan? Snag a ride downtown and go to a gay bar. Enjoy a drink or two, see who’s there and then walk a few short blocks to another gay bar. Then mosey on to a third gay bar that’s again only walking distance away. Repeat every weekend. This doesn’t sound like an L.A. night out, but by the end of this summer, Downtown Los Angeles will house three recently opened gay bars—a fun, walkable triangle that marks a new age for gay nightlife outside West Hollywood and Silver Lake. First, Precinct celebrated its grand opening on June 17, sitting a story above the traffic of South Broadway and 4th Street. Next, Redline opened its doors for business on July 14, just blocks away on the corner of South Los Angeles and 6th. And by late summer, these two will be joined by Bar Mattachine at Broadway and 7th—just a five-minute walk back to Precinct. It’s not exactly a coincidence that three new establishments should suddenly arise in a neighborhood not exactly known for dedicated gay nightlife, aside from the longstanding New Jalisco Bar on Main and popular dance party Mustache Mondays at La Cita over on South Hill. Precinct, Redline and Mattachine’s near-simultaneous arrival results from the gradual need for new, different gay spaces in the greater Los Angeles area, but in particular Downtown, whose growing population currently boasts an estimated 50,000—five times more than it did in 2005.
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f the five new bars that have opened downtown in the last year, two of them are gay bars. (Mattachine’s arrival will see gay bars and non-gay bars break even.) It’s a change welcomed by City Councilmember Jose Huizar, whose district includes Downtown. “Every great city needs a great downtown, and the more inclusionary DTLA is, the greater it will be,” says Huizar, who also said he’d help usher along future LGBT venues in the future. Thor Stephens, co-owner of Precinct with Brian McIntire, explains that his bar serves the larger L.A. gay community but especially the concentrated population of downtown gays who might otherwise need to trek elsewhere. “There’s a whole group of men here that I haven’t seen before,” says Stephens, who was previously the bar manager at Faultline on L.A.’s East Side. “I haven’t seen these guys in West Hollywood. I haven’t seen these guys in Silver Lake. They’re
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downtown, and there was nowhere to go here.” Now there is, and as Stephens sees it, that’s a good sign for gay Los Angeles. “For a long time, gay bars didn’t open; they closed,” he says. “It’s good for everyone if we can revitalize gay nightlife and get people to go out and do stuff, as opposed to just sitting at home with their damn phones.” Oliver Alpuche, co-owner of Redline with Zachary Beus, echoes Stephens’ statements. “Downtown Los Angeles specifically had been a dead zone for years, and people are finally realizing that there’s a lot of growth and opportunity here,” he says. A DTLA resident, Alpuche says the idea to open up a bar arose when Beus moved downtown as well and asked a simple question: “What do we do?” Alpuche explained where the gay bars were, and Beus was surprised at how decentralized gay life was from downtown. “After a few years, we’d see many other members of the LGBT community out on the streets, and we wondered, ‘Where does everyone go out at night?’” he says. Fourteen months later, Redline became the second of Downtown Los Angeles’ new gay bars. Its arrival doesn’t threaten Precinct’s success, however. As the two pairs of bar owners readily attest, having multiple gay bars is a boon for business. “What Brian and Thor are doing will definitely help bring the crowd downtown—and help keep people who are already downtown from going elsewhere,” Alpuche says. “It’s win-win.” Stephens says he and McIntire even gave the Redline owners the benefit of their experience navigating the various processes needed to open a bar. “Part of it is self-serving,” he admits. “If they exist and there’s more draw to downtown, we all benefit.” Enter Bar Mattachine, which has yet to nail down a solid opening date but whose owners aim to start welcoming patrons in late summer. Garrett McKechnie (pictured behind the bar at right), co-owner alongside Vee Delgadillo and Jigger Mercado, agrees that DTLA was begging for new gay nightspots. “There’s a very creative, interesting vibe happening downtown,” McKechnie says. “People have been saying that it’s been coming for a while, and now it’s actually happening. Just walking Spring Street between 5th and 7th, I’m blown away. There are so many young single people moving there. It’s only appropriate for some new gay establishments to open up.” And McKechnie agrees that the Precinct-Redline-Mattachine