The bar is divided into three sections: main floor, basement, and spacious back patio. She's glamorous but sweaty-the place is packed. Another drag queen, Atasha Manila, is running around the bar chatting with patrons. She says she's getting tipped very well at the Swallow.ĭirectly across the street at the Lumber Yard Bar, a lumberjack-themed gay bar, it's even rowdier. She tells me no: She also performed at the Pride flag-raising event two days earlier. I ask Baby Guuurl if this is her first time here. Perhaps it's the novelty of being in a new place, but many men lock eyes with me, the sort of eye-locking that says, "Blow me-please?" The scene is very cruisey, but friendly-friendlier than Seattle. "Girl, White Center is lit, girl," Baby Guuurl says to me, flipping her hair and checking out the men around her. I am told there will be no cat food tonight.
She's about to perform her second number of the night at the Swallow. I'm surprised to see her in White Center, because she's normally based in Seattle. She wears a curvy, houndstooth print dress with western fringe. On another rowdy night during White Center Pride weekend, I run into Baby Guuurl, a loud up-and-coming drag queen who got her start in the scene by performing numbers where she ate cat food onstage. Since it is not actually a center for whites, the saying for the neighborhood has long been: "Not so white, not so centered." Dozens of languages are spoken, from Thai to Somali. It's majority-minority, with the 2010 US Census showing the area to be 60 percent communities of color. It's important to note that while the neighborhood is named White Center, it is ironically one of the most diverse areas in all of King County.
#MISPLACED GAY PRIDE STICKERS HOW TO#
He'll happily show you how to mount a fern if you ask.
These include the Lumber Yard Bar and the Swallow, the area's first gay bars, but also Dottie's Double Wide, a trailer-themed bar and restaurant, and the Plant Store, a very cute plant shop owned by a nice man named Miles. Maring and Loughridge say they created the Pride fest as a way of getting the neighborhood together, but also to show off many of the new small and gay-owned businesses that have popped up in White Center. The performance from the Rat City Queens-named after the neighborhood's nickname, Rat City-was attended by hundreds of people, many of them families. Roller Derby team, ended up raising more than $1,000 for Lambert House, a community center for LGBTQ+ youth in the greater Seattle area. Southgate Roller Rink's Pride Skate Night, cohosted by Girl Scout Troop #44284 and the Southside Revolution Coed Jr. A glimpse inside the all-ages Pride Skate Night at Southgate Roller Rink.