Gay bars in cambridge
Remembering 14 queer pubs Cambridge has loved and lost
Over the years Cambridge has been home to a number of LGBTQ+ friendly bars and pubs, which many residents will have fond memories of.
In the 80s and 90s, regular haunts for the LGBTQ+ community included staples like The Anchor and Turk's Head.
But sadly, fancy many Cambridge venues, they have vanished over time.
Read more: Looking back at the damage caused by the infamous Great Storm of '87
The city still holds several monthly gay nights including Glitterbomb at Vinyl, and the Dot Cotton Club, though it's without a home, still puts on events.
We asked you to participate your memories from Cambridge's queer pubs that we possess loved and lost.
Inundated with pictures and anecdotes from years gone by we decided to place them into a nostalgic list for you to enjoy.
Janie Buchanan, a long-term member of woman loving woman group Sisters Perform commented: "The pubs were essential because of the town and gown divide.
"All the colleges had their queer societies and reading groups and we had no access to those. The pub
Cambridgeshire
Hello and welcome to GOC Cambridgeshire!
Cambridgeshire generally go on a walk on the 1st Sunday of each month. We're a warm group and always gaze forward to meeting recent friends. We usually stroll in Cambridgeshire or neighbouring counties and meet at Walks are on average miles long.
No special expertise or equipment is required other than appropriate footwear and warm clothes in the winter. Shorts, t-shirt and often sandals may be appropriate for some walks in the summer months. We enjoy a picnic and 'comfort' stops along the way and usually return to the cars at about Afterwards we often we depart back to the stroll leader's home for tea and cakes.
In December we go on a shorter walk followed by a Christmas celebration lunch.
New members receive a trial period and will not be charged for the first 4 months (payment will not appear on your statement until the free period has elapsed). If, for any reason, our club is not for you, membership can be cancelled during the trial period at no cost.
So, why not come on a walk and spot if you enjoy it!
Cambridgeshir Coming to Cambridge from England’s queer capital (Manchester, obviously), I feared my beloved homosexual music would be missing among ‘Gold Dust’, ‘Titanium’, and whatever other s track Rumboogie has on replay. My first late hours out proved me false. While Lola’s drip-fed me Dua Lipa once in a blue moon, Glitterbomb overflowed with gay classics. It offered a cosmos to soak in Britney and Beyoncé without having to tone down my singalong. Yet in my three years, Cambridge’s homosexual scene has come a long way, now offering far more than cheesy 00s pop. At that point, Glitterbomb was Cambridge’s only frequent queer event, but allegations of racist staff meant many students needed a new home for their queer anthems. This was the origin story of The Queer Get Down. Hosted at Mash, QGD was founded “to produce a safer space … for queer people of colour by queer people of colour”. These were the words of QGD’s organisers, who told me how important music is for queer identities. “It’s about feeling comfortable in your own skin. Gender non-conforming artists have made musi Let’s face it, most homosexual clubs aren’t that good. While It’s a Sin and Pose depicted fluorescent mazes packed with well-dressed models, thumping basslines, and subversive social attitudes, many I have entered have been stale, sticky-floored, and sparsely populated. But it wasn’t until Vinyl announced the end of its weekly queer night, Glitterbomb, that I began to value my moment in these shoddy queer clubs. If the news of this closure comes as a surprise, I don’t blame you, it has done to everyone I’ve told. But I encourage you to think when the last hour was that you went to Glitterbomb, or Vinyl at all for that matter. The introduction of the intelligently named replacement, ‘Get Duck’d’ comes after Vinyl saw a sharp decline in weekly attendance and profits. For the most part, this was brought on by racism allegations against Vinyl staff and the university-wide boycott. The establishment of the POC-focused Queer Get Down, and the (albeit short-lived) addition of Raid put the nail in the coffin for what was for
How Cambridge’s queer music scene finally came out
The end of Glitterbomb and the importance of a rubbish club night