Is Old Market’s status as Bristol’s ‘gay village’ a thing of the past? 

It was once a golden mile of shopping, a centre of trade and culture and a major tram terminus.

That was until World War II and a planning disaster which led to the Temple Way bypass cutting the area off from Castle Park and the city centre – leaving Old Market Street a near-derelict strip.

But in the 1990s, the area slowly awakened from a long period of relative neglect. A vanguard of queer people opened shops, pubs, bars, clubs and a sauna, engaged with local politics, and helped to regenerate the inner city area. It was then that Old Market saw its resurgence as the core of the city’s LGBTQ+ scene and became proclaimed by many as Bristol’s ‘gay village’.

However, new data throws into question the neighbourhood’s modern and widely-regarded status as the city’s ‘gay village’.

In the once-in-a-decade data gathering survey, the 2021 Census results officially includes LGBTQ+ people in Bristol’s story, and reveals that here over six per cent of people are not heterosexual, and just over three per cent of the South West declared themselves as gay or lesbian, bisexual, pansexual, asexual and queer. This is nearly double the national average of 3.2 per cent of the population who say they have a sexual identity that is not straight.

While it is a watershed moment for putting LGBTQ+ people on the map, a community shunned from census data for two centuries, examining hyper-local data through a new interactive map reveals Old Market is no longer a hub for queer people as it, albeit anecdotally, once was. The Centre & Harbourside comes up trumps with 12.8 per cent identifying as lesbian, gay, bisexual or other, while in Barton Hill, the area which encapsulates Old Market, the figure is much lower at 5.2 per cent.

This prompts the question: is Old Market’s status as Bristol’s gay village a thing of the past?

Old Market Street was was once a golden mile of shopping, a centre of trade and culture and a major tram terminus – photo: Bristol Archives

“When I took over the bar, Old Market was really, really vibrant,” says Steve Keating, owner for 15 years of Bristol Bear Bar, said to be the only bespoke bear bar in the UK.

“It was real for a very short period. There was a gay scene and it was the heart of the LGBT community in Bristol. It was amazing. It felt like we were on the map, almost like a mini Canal Street or a mini Soho.”

Harking back to the inception of Bristol’s gay village, Steve said: “There was the Bear Bar, the Palace, the Retreat, Flamingos nightclub, the sauna, Market Tavern and more. It really was wonderful.

“Everybody knew everybody and we had a scene where we would meet regularly to come together and discuss issues. We had taken a basically rundown derelict area and turned it into a rich nighttime economy.”

The anecdotal association between queer city-dwellers and their role in changing the makeup of inner-cities has long been noted. Historically, they have often flocked together in cheaper areas of inner cities, seeking both affordable rent and an accepting community.

This is in the context of homosexuality being partially decriminalised in 1967, meaning gay men could have sex as long as it was in private, was only between two men and both were over 21. For many, however, and decades after, homophobia remained rife.

Bristol Bear Bar is said to be the only bespoke bear bar in the UK – photo: Betty Woolerton

“Old Market provided a safe space, not only just for the LGBT community but for anybody living in the area,” explained Steve, who lives in Easton. “It was renowned for squats, drug dealing, prostitution and all of those things. It wasn’t somewhere that you kind of would have felt very comfortable late at night, but we changed that completely.”

When residents voted in 2016 in a referendum to back a local plan that aims to see community influence over development of the area, Steve and others were excited at the prospect of having a voice in planning decisions.

He said: “Bristol City Council were going to do all of these projects to improve the area, make it much more kind of alive after decades of rack and ruin. Obviously, not much changed and the scene imploded on itself.”

Emblematic of the waning of the gay-identified neighbourhood in Bristol was the closure of the Gin Palace, a legendary venue famed for its precipitously sloping floor and drag queens performing among its faded Victorian grandeur. It was at the heart of Old Market’s LGBTQ+ scene but closed in 2018. The grade II-listed building, built, according to legend, in anticipation of a new railway terminus that never came, remains empty and disfigured by graffiti.

Even before then, dozens of other venues said goodbye to Bristol, leaving Bristol Bear Bar along with OMG and the Queen Shilling, both on Frogmore Street, “the only gay bars in the city”, Steve lamented. While it’s true that pub closures is a problem that has also struck straight venues, unlike gay venues, they don’t yet face the reality of becoming an endangered species.

Steve blames a myriad of triggers for the Old Market’s decline, from the cost of living crisis to the availability of cheap alcohol in supermarkets to the catalytic effect of dwindling business in the city centre.

Gavin Baker marched through Bristol Pride 2022 armed with a placard calling for Old Market’s gay scene to be revived – photo: Betty Woolerton

But not all the reasons behind the recent changes in Old Market are entirely bad, suggested Gavin Baker, project manager and Old Market resident. “Because of the persecution of LGBT and queer people through the 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s, there was a real reason for gay venues,” Gavin told me on a recent afternoon in 25A, the skyline punctuated by newbuilds stretching into the sky visible from the window.

“We’ve had people that were literal outcasts that had been turfed out on their own and didn’t have anywhere to go. But, I think, as society has become more tolerant, queer people have integrated or maybe homogenised more into the general society, there’s less need for a village.”

In the same vein, Gavin, 37, said advancing technology means queer people no longer need to cluster physically to meet. “Queer spaces have changed a lot, especially since the advent of the Internet. People have moved on from physical space to digital, and I think that’s reflected in the decline of LGBT venues.”

Despite this, there are calls to revive the once-bustling gay scene in Old Market. Gavin went to last year’s Bristol Pride with a placard that read: ‘Make Old Market gay again’, “to acknowledge the ongoing gentrification in the area”.

In 2018, the Sunday Times listed Old Market as the second coolest neighbourhood in the UK. “Your parents might not want to park their car in your ‘hood’ but Old Market is “fun, fiercely independent and friendly”, the newspaper said, putting the area in the same league as achingly trendy London districts such as Shoreditch and Dalston.

It’s a theme explored in producer, actor and storyteller Tom Marshman’s show ‘Old Market (REMIXED)’, in which he shared first-hand stories from the folk who inhabit the strip, from sex shops to sourdough bakeries (although Assembly Bakery on West Street is another recent casualty in the area, having closed in February).

In the one-man performance, Tom explored the way that flat whites in brown paper cups that come alongside developments have changed the face of the Old Market strip over the last 20 years into a melting pot of old and new.

……………………………

Read more: A glimpse into the hidden histories of Old Market

……………………………

“The face of the high street is definitely changing,” Gavin said. “You can walk past an artisanal plant shop, you could get your loaf of sourdough from a bakery and a craft beer from the pub, then you walk past a massage parlour, and then an upholsterer. It’s certainly an interesting makeup. But I have noticed, as the years go on, the queer spaces in Old Market are getting boarded up.”

While the crux of the gentrification problem is certainly housing becoming increasingly unaffordable, Baker highlighted another, subtler impact: “People coalesce and mix in gay pubs. I’ve met so many people that I wouldn’t necessarily meet with in my professional life or social circle there, and that enriches our community. That’s what gentrification and the marginalisation of the high street threatens: our diversity.”

On the other hand, Steve believes, after the long, pandemic-induced struggle for Bristol Bear Bar, the regeneration of Old Market has its silver linings, saying “anything that is going to refurbish derelict, horrible hovels is a bonus”.

These days, to Steve, Old Market is “still eclectic and really quite wonderful”.

“Yes, we’ve lost all the venues that we had and we lost the scene. But the people that have come along, from the Ill Repute and Assembly, the Old Castle Green and the Old Market Tavern are brilliant.

“They’re not gay venues, but they’re gay friendly. They’re really nice people, and they’re really all making their venues work. Although times have changed, there is still a kind of sense of togetherness.”

Main photo: Betty Woolerton

Read next:

• Outpouring of support to keep rainbow canopy overlooking gorge
• A glimpse into the hidden histories of Old Market
• The emerging collectives shaking up Bristol’s LGBTQ+ scene

Listen to the latest Bristol24/7 Behind the Headlines podcast: