Homophobia Shut Down 12th Street Gym

If I were to tell you there was a fitness center in the heart of the city that had a swimming pool, racquetball court, basketball court, sauna, sun deck, about ten thousand square feet of gym equipment, and sprawling classrooms for endless free classes, you'd think I was crazy. If I told you it cost about $29 a month, came with two free training sessions, seven individual guest passes, all without the nefarious upsell and membership cancellation practices of corporate gyms, you'd have me committed. 

But it did exist, for nearly three decades, and it finally closed its doors because New Philadelphians and Millennials have turned Philadelphia into a hot-bed of pro-corporate snobbery. 

From the outside, 12th Street Gym is unassuming. The only thing indicating it's more than a warehouse along the Gayborhood's 12th Street Strip is the stunning mural of LGBT rights activist, Gloria Casarez. Once a gay bathhouse - community code for a den of anonymous sex - the gym had a hard time shaking its former reputation. Many straight men and women no doubt avoided the notion of joining a "gay gym," while gay men scoffed at the connotation it carried, all despite its bevy of services and modest membership price. Nonetheless, it catered to over 4000 active members, many dedicated for a long time. I'd been a member myself since I moved to Philadelphia in 2004. When 12th Street Gym closed, I declined the extended membership offered for Philadelphia Sports Club, and like so many others, opted for Optimal Sports Health Club nearby at Walnut and Juniper. 

Optimal is a fine facility, casually referred to as "the other gay gym." The day after 12th Street closed, Optimal was taxed with a barrage of new members. Underestimating just how many would reject PSC's offer, Optimal quickly annexed an additional 800 square feet of space. Still, the gym is small, roughly the size of one of 12th Street's many floors. It's practical. There is no common space, no juice bar, and it's tucked down a small street. Once again, like so many LGBT venues in Philadelphia, the community has been hidden from plain site. 

What made 12th Street Gym so popular with those of us who embraced it, and the very reason we sought out Optimal in lieu of PSC, is that it was more than a fitness center, it was the Gayborhood's community center. With more and more mainstream development expanding throughout the neighborhood, with developers adopting the phrase "Midtown Village" beyond the confines of 13th and Chestnut, it's not hard to feel the pangs of gentrification. We need places like 12th Street Gym, places to gather beyond booze and hookups. I like Optimal, but it isn't one of those places. 

"Midtown Village" itself, though it started merely as a business collective along the once-beleaguered 13th Street, is a concept met with understandable reservation within the LGBT community. Real estate agents use the term to sell and rent apartments to those who might be skittish about living in a "gay ghetto." You wouldn't be hard-pressed to overhear a few sipping mimosas at Green Eggs Cafe, even cocktails at Woody's, espouse how the neighborhood is changing without a hint of dismay. 

Indeed it is changing.

Woody's, once Philadelphia's go-to gay bar, is now avoided by local LGBT individuals: it caters to bridal parties on some sort of safari. 

While this change may be good for developers, it's not for a still-marginalized community. Exposed by the apparent connotation in the word "Gayborhood," a brand only whispered by heterosexual newcomers, is a latent underlying homophobia more dangerous than arbitrary protesters at a Pride parade. Why? Well it's hard to know your enemy when they're self-professed liberals from Park Slope who don't want to admit they don't want you around their kids. 

This discrimination would be far more apparent were developers renaming the Italian Market. What would it say about race if real estate agents began referring to Chinatown as "East Market Village" because, for some reason, they had a hard time moving condos in an ethnic enclave? But that's exactly what's happening in the Gayborhood, and it's going unchecked. 

12th Street Gym had financial problems, that's very true. Several years ago, the Department of Licenses and Inspections slapped them with a fine for inadequate fire doors necessitating $500,000 in renovations. However, as I was getting my hair cut at Rossi's next to the gym shortly after it closed, I was talking about those exact problems with several former members and my barber, and it became clear that the gym easily could have crowd-funded the money needed to remain open. $500,000 is by no means a small sum, but the LGBT community is by no means loose. Thanks to dealing with a whole lot of shit, we're a tight group that comes to the aid of one another. In a few years, even a few months, we could have raised the funds. I would have gladly pitched in one of those thousands. 

The truth is, 12th Street Gym didn't fit in with what the city is becoming. The gym didn't close when it failed to meet L&I's standards, it closed when a development company from New York purchased the property. No doubt two lawsuits regarding a handsy massage therapist didn't help matters, but the second lawsuit was incredibly sketchy. In a facility as large as 12th Street Gym, and one that had been open for so long, these unfortunate cases happen. That's why gyms, therapists, and trainers pay massive insurance premiums. 

None of this would have closed 12th Street Gym a decade ago. L&I's fire safety standards haven't changed that substantially, if at all in the last ten years. But L&I and other city agencies have been working at the behest of gentrification, targeting locally owned businesses and granting passes to the corporate conglomerates that fall in line with developers' largest profits. It wouldn't be hard to imagine Midwood Corporation flipping the bill for $500,000 in renovations if they could land a corporate tenant like Planet Fitness, or something more marketable to the "Midtown Village" set. 12th Street Gym just didn't fit the mold of newcomers, and the L&I violations and lawsuits proved worthy scapegoats to shut the place down. In 2018, gay owned and operated businesses still carry a stigma amid the happy couples pushing baby carriages through "Midtown Village." And that's profoundly sad for those of us not born with the privilege of being "normal."  

Philadelphia's Polished Turd

In Inga Saffron's latest article, she refers to Brickstone's East Chestnut development as a "Cinderella transformation," and spends a lot of words gushing about Blackney Hayes traditional design for The Collins, named for the Oppenheim, Collins & Co. department store the developer partially demolished. 

Don't get me wrong, I'm one of Saffron's biggest fans. My mom referred to her as "a modern day Ayn Rand," and politics aside, I tend to agree. Her passion for architecture as art has helped elevate her readers' demands for quality design well above the expectations in bigger and "better" cities. And more to the point, her articles - including this one - avoid the academic mumbo-jumbo that plague architectural critiques and alienate lay readers in the Times.

But on East Chestnut, I don't see a Cinderella Story, at least not one that turns a peasant into a princess. A DelCo prom queen, maybe. East Chestnut Street's renaissance, one piece in the larger transformation taking place east of Broad, isn't a fairy tale bringing about something uniquely special. It isn't Walnut Street, Passyunk Square, The Piazza, or even South Street. From the Convention Center District to what I loathe to call Midtown Village, the change unfolding is textbook urban-suburbanization carbon copied from second rate cities around the country. 

And Philadelphia is better than Indianapolis. 

Although East Chestnut is currently seeing a few quirky independent and local businesses emerge from the wreckage of 1976's ridiculous Chestnut Street Transway, the trend won't stick. Philly Cupcake already closed due to increased rent, MilkBoy is on its way to South Street, and I Goldberg is looking for a new home. The Collins, and NREA's East Market a block away, will put a lot of residents east of Broad and even more pedestrians on the sidewalks, but don't expect the kinds of locals that transformed West Walnut Street to be filling their beds. 

East Chestnut's transformation, and more broadly East Market's, is not one of local wizardry. It isn't the dynamic and uniquely Philadelphian approach that piqued the nation's interest in the early 2000s and put us back on the map. It isn't Susanna Foo and Alma de Cuba and Rouge and Astral Plane and all the weirdly fabulous places that made Philadelphia the "it" place to be for those in-the-know.

It's corporate. It's Target. And it's everything that demands more chains.

While PREIT's renovations at the Gallery may have stalled, there is no doubt in my mind that Market East is poised to take off. Curmudgeonly locals may claim that Market East will never be more than a Hooverville illuminated in LED ads for Dunkin' Donuts, but they'll be eating crow the moment East Market opens their doors. I'm not being optimistic when I say this. I don't like the model East Market and East Chestnut have chosen, but mark my words, there will be a crane on the Disney Hole in less than ten years. And it will be because of Target. 

Target is a beast, but it's a suburban beast, even when it's downtown. All you need to do is look to nearby cities to see what follows. The Target in Washington D.C. reinvented Columbia Heights, a neighborhood demographically similar to Market East, and it did so by cramming the trappings of suburbia into a mini-mall. The area surrounding it is chock full of luxury apartments, shiny and new, but in no way reminiscent of their environs. Columbia Heights now looks like its inner-suburban cousins in Clarendon and Crystal City, all thanks to Target, its only lingering urbanity the low income residents City Council requires they continue to house.

A block from our own City Hall without similar housing requirements in place, Market East and East Chestnut are poised to be even more bland because it will be empirically desirable to the Starbucks and beer swilling Basic B's and Bros. It will no doubt be lauded as "cool," but no one's really cool when everyone is.

Within a one or two block radius, Target will suck everything into its high-rent orbit. After its first Michael Graves tea kettle leaves the checkout aisle, it's only a matter of time before property owners begin upping their rent or selling out to national developers, before Cella Luxuria and Lapstone & Hammer start looking for other neighborhoods. We won't see the kind of organic transformation that created Walnut Street, instead we'll see University City downtown. Another Chipotle. A sushirrito joint. Another Starbucks. Then another. Then another. Then a Comcast Experience Store. Sure, that's just capitalism, but unchecked it eradicates diversity and creates neighborhoods for the most mundane un-individals. New Philadelphians who dedicate Instagram accounts to Chipotle despite what happens to their bodies seven hours later.

These are people who don't get cities, and don't get local businesses. These are people who look at the corner dry cleaner with disdain and say, "that would make such a great gastropub." These are the people who will be Market East. And they'll be the first to leave when their kids reach pre-k and realize just how bad our schools are, because they helped crowd-fund a beer garden instead of a library.

It's not necessarily bad for Center City, at least as a whole, or financially. Downtown Philadelphia needed a place to dump its suburban garbage, and ever since Kmart closed, people have needed a place to buy kitty litter and toothpaste. Target - three of them in fact - is our answer. But don't fool yourself into thinking that the 1100 block of Chestnut Street is some kind of Cinderella Story unless your notion of Cinderella picked up her gown under the fluorescent glow of a Target and chucked it into a shopping cart next to a box of Tampax and a plastic barrel of cheese balls. 

East Chestnut and the greater Market East vicinity is undergoing a transformation, but it's purely pragmatic. A place for auto-tethered Millennials to pretend they're being urban and conventioneers to find a little piece of Oklahoma City. It's going to be big, it's going to be shiny, and it's going to change Center City Philadelphia. But the only thing that will make it unique is that it will upend everything that has made our city so special. 

Our individuality. 

Priced out of the Gayborhood

With residential high-rises encroaching from each direction, Center City's hottest neighborhood is inarguably the Gayborhood right now, and it's been no stranger to the causalities of development and rising rent. Just last Sunday, the neighborhood's oldest gay bar, Venture Inn, arguably the nation's oldest, served its last stiff cocktail. 

With the exception of Venture, much of the change has been welcome, to varying degrees. Long vacant storefronts have begun to fill out and 13th Street's strip of hoagie shops were replaced with some of the best restaurants in the region. But the gentrification tipping point in this southeast corner of Center City is coming sooner than later, and it's being pushed by the promise of large chains like Target and a mammoth entertainment and residential complex at 12th and Market. 

Both may mean little to the quaint streets of the Gayborhood, at least to the brick-and-mortar, but they are rapidly eroding the cultural balance between the area's newcomers and those who haven't left. What it does mean is rising property value, which may encourage some business owners to cash out and pressure others to relocate. 

The latest hit came to I. Goldberg Army & Navy, which has stood at 13th and Chestnut for almost a century. With PMC Property Group asking for $600,000 a year for the three story retail space, I. Goldberg will be packing up and looking for a nearby location. 

However, of all the changes unfolding from the "Midtown Village" assault on the Gayborhood, I. Goldberg may be unfortunate, but not exactly surprising. My father, who used to take the West Chester train downtown in the 1950s to sift through the militariana in I. Goldberg's basement, recently payed the store a visit only to say "it hasn't changed a bit." 


What's unfortunate is that I. Goldberg, which is a very unique store for Center City, has been regarded by many New Philadelphians and Millennials as just another Shirt Corner, a ruff-n-ready nonsense store that inexplicably survived fifteen years into the 21st Century. And while the comparison is far from true, part of the assumption is I. Goldberg's fault. 

Nostalgia can't sustain itself on the fact that it exists, and with Philadelphia evolving, I. Goldberg needs to do the same. The store's most unique gadgets - the kinds of things you'd expect to find in a surplus shop - are buried in the basement. It's most marketable products - jackets, coats, boots, and outdoor gear - are upstairs. Meanwhile, the main floor is a crowded mess of oversized flannel shirts and Dad Jeans shoveled behind a security guard. Its first impression doesn't exactly sing the same tune as those renting $1500 a month apartments upstairs. 

What's ironic is just how easily they could. They have some great products. But if I was heading back from a few mimosas at Green Eggs on a cold January day and looking for a NorthFace jacket, I'd have no idea that I. Goldberg sold them, unless I stared at chaotic window display for about fifteen minutes. And even then, I'd probably assume they were second-hand. Plus they close at 5:45PM and don't open on Sundays. 

If they scaled back their inventory, right-sized their space, and merchandized their supply properly, they could easily compete with Center City sporting goods stores, and even still manage to offer a few of the unique products that the hipsters covet, like Soviet era military watches. 

Gentrification may be quickly terraforming the Gayborhood, but this loss is on us. 

Last Call: Venture Inn

With Venture Inn closing next weekend, I can't point out the exact reason I'm so torn up. Perhaps that's because there are so many things about its closure that break my subtly jaded, yet big gay heart. 

It's not like I "came out" at Venture Inn, or in Philadelphia for that matter. It's never been a must-see social spot for visitors. It's not a house pumping danceteria like Woody's or a musclebound hookup joint like U-Bar. It's not even "Gay Cheers" like the quietly shuttered Westbury. 

What it was, and is for the next nine nights, is the Gayborhood's cozy neighborhood bar, one that happens to put on the best drag show in Philadelphia (sorry, Bob and Barbara's).

It's also a microcosm of a Philadelphia - and a Gayborhood - that is slowly fading amid cultural shifts, an influx of new residents, and massive development. Change is inevitable and it's necessary for a city's evolution. Places that don't change or fall in line with the trends of the time are often casualties of progress. 

For the past forty years, Venture Inn has been "the other gay bar," and for the past forty years Philadelphia has remained relatively frozen in time. Until recently, that worked in Venture Inn's favor. Philadelphia's gay bars were windowless fortresses, many tucked down tiny streets like Camac. If you wanted to go to a gay bar ten years ago, you couldn't help but feel a little seedy. But when real estate brainiacs decided to callously rename the Gayborhood, "Midtown Village" in some attempt to quell the nonexistent homophobia of buyers they thought wouldn't be too keen on raising their kids in a gay ghetto, the game changed. 

It started when an admittedly crappy stretch of 13th Street was packed with some of the best restaurants in the tristate area. Then came Green Eggs where chicks in Jackie O glasses could nurse their hangovers in bottomless pitchers of heartburn. And finally, Nest, because you're never too young to start CrossFit, even if you're two. 

Today, those new to Philadelphia have no idea just how gay the Gayborhood used to be, even when its most lavender venues didn't even have windows. 

Business-savvy gay bars took advantage of their revived (albeit homogenized) neighborhood and the public's curious interest the LGBT community and reinvented themselves. Woody's renovated. Uncles and 12th Air changed their names to U-Bar and iCandy. All of them traded their soulless speakeasy walls for windows. With Philadelphia rebranded as the 21st Century "it" town, our gay bars followed suit. Most of them.

Venture Inn has redecorated over the years, but it's always ended there. Today, to New Philadelphians and their concept of cool, Venture is a venue that clings to a time newbies are desperate to amputate.

Part of Venture's reluctance to rebrand itself might simply be because it worked. On any given night it's packed. It's not just a gay bar, it's the Gayborhood's industry bar. When the restaurants close, waiters and even a few notable chefs sidle up to Venture's bar for a stiff cocktail and some attitude. Despite those who refuse to venture in (ha, get it?), it's hard to imagine why Venture Inn needs to close. It might not cater to those constantly seeking out the next hot fad, but it has a niche. 

It's a second home to Gen Xers and Babyboomers who never really needed a reinvented watering hole, and Millennials who tire of the vapid dominance of today's fickly disaffected iPhone holders. In that regard, Venture Inn is the perfect dive bar, and not in the pejorative sense. The jukebox is loaded with a mix of Motown, disco, grunge, and '80s era electronica, and after a few drinks, it's hard to remember if it's 2016, 1970, or a future that never happened. Instead of inundating its customers with the inexplicable insurrection of 21st Century pompousness, it's exactly what the crowd makes of it. 

For me, Venture Inn holds a special place, mainly made from memories. In a changing city, I suppose that's all we have, and all we should try to make of innumerable, upcoming iterations. But I'm not someone who likes change or takes it well. Perhaps that's because I didn't grow up in a city, but rather a place where time stood and still stands still. When I make friends, go on a date, or find a place like Venture Inn I want it to last forever. It's naive, I know, but it's a habit that's hard to kick.

To many, Venture Inn's closure is just a sign of the times or worse, irrelevant. But to me, it's a passing. The loss of a place where I met some of the most amazing people in Philadelphia - hell, the world - and looking around, it's not a place that's going to be replaced. Quickly approaching forty, like Venture Inn, I've come to the realization that my Philadelphia, my Gayborhood, and my neighborhood bars are products of another era, relegated to the annals of history and time. 

I wouldn't be who I am without Venture Inn. Whether that's good or bad is debatable, but it's where I am and I'm happy. My life may not be complete, but it's content, and part of that is thanks to performers like Sandy Beach, bartenders like Henry, and the crowds of proud misfits at Venture Inn. 

Lapstone & Hammer

Philadelphia's gay scene, although geographically small, is anything but a subdued presence. Despite its unofficial rebranding as Midtown Village, the rainbows - from street signs to neon rooftops - make it very apparent that Google Maps was correct in keeping it labeled the "Gayborhood." 

But if you're a gay man who's ever lived in any other major city, you might be wondering why our Gayborhood seems solely fixated on local dining and nightlife. Sure, the bars and restaurants are fantastic, and many of them locally owned and operated by members of our LGBT community. Yet when it comes to shopping the streets of Walnut, 12th, or 13th, you're hard pressed to find fashion foreword clothing that isn't geared towards a 50 year old woman. 

Not that there's anything wrong with that, and not that fashion forward men's clothing is geared exclusively towards gay men. And if you want to find a sexy outfit for Saturday night, Diesel and Urban Outfitters are on the other side or Broad Street paired appropriately with other prominent chains. 

What's missing isn't the chains, though. Despite all the retail gripes about Center City's struggle to compete with King of Prussia and Cherry Hill, we have plenty of fantastic retail options otherwise found in suburban malls. But I'm not talking about Forever 21 and H&M. I'm talking about men's boutiques that offer unique and stylish options from obscure manufacturers. And most cities seem to have at least one, and it's usually where the gays dine and dance.

I still have a sweater I bought in D.C.'s DuPoint Circle more than fifteen years ago, it has yet to go out of style, and when I'm asked where I got it, I can proudly utter a name no one's ever heard of. And believe me, I'm a far cry from a Fashion Plate. 

Over the years, Philadelphia's Gaybodhood has hosted a few unique men's boutiques. Sparacino's on 13th Street is largely regarded as the catalyst that ignited the street's retail prominence. Unfortunately Tony Sparacino passed away eight years ago. His legacy lives on in an annual scholarship aimed at LGBT art students, but his clothing store vanished. 

In 2011, Matthew Izzo brought his New York boutique to Philadelphia's Gayborhood along with a wave of "Sixth Borough" transplants, later opening another in Old City. But as far as I can tell, his presence in Philadelphia is relegated to an online store. Around the same time the Philadelphia Home Art Garden, or P.H.A.G. ambitiously moved its knick-knack and card shop from its humble 12th Street location to a much larger space on Walnut, and began offering clothing and furniture. Soon after, P.H.A.G. shut its doors, and like Matthew Izzo, its presence was moved to the internet.

For many of these boutiques, particularly the latter two, it would now seem it was an unfortunate case of too much too soon. If you're a woman looking for champaign and shoes, your shopping options are a dime a dozen. But if you're a Center City man looking for a shopping experience, you've got to hoof it to East Passyunk's Metro Men's Clothing. But that's about to change, or apparently already has. Had Matthew Izzo and P.H.A.G. waited a few short years to expand, they might still be in the Gayborhood. 

Lapstone & Hammer recently set up shop in the former City Blue near 11th and Chestnut. Likely following the trend of East Chestnut's transformation, Lapstone & Hammer is the kind of boutique that begs to be dubbed "artisan." If you're a man who wishes that Blake Lively or Gwenyth Paltrow had more to say about your fashion options on their blogs, Lapstone & Hammer is for you.

While it doesn't posses the same quirks and characteristics of the LGBT inspired men's boutiques that adorned our gay enclaves from the 80s into the early 21st Century, there is less reason for such businesses to exist. That's apparent in our Gayborhood's rapid evolution, as well as an enhanced market in urban men - gay or straight - no longer resigned to buying bags of white tube socks and Levi's from Kohl's. 

On a side note, it appears that Lapstone & Hammer intends to restore the building's wild Vitrolite facade.

Unicorn Poop

When I first read about the upcoming rainbow crosswalks in the Gayborhood, I thought it was a great idea. Then I saw this...

...and immediately thought this...

But unicorn poop might not be such a bad thing. After all, "Midtown Village" seems to be catching on, and despite the rainbow street signs, 13th Street is starting to look a lot like Old City, and Woody's - a once gay staple - is now a non-stop bachelorette party. People could use a reminder. 

The New Spruce Parker Hotel

After a fire broke out on the 9th floor of the infamous Spruce Parker Hotel at 13th and Spruce last year, many locals cheered. But the revelry was premature, and what we've been left with is a vacant eyesore on a prime corner of Center City. Perhaps worse, a longtime popular restaurant and bar, the Westbury, closed with it.

Since then there's been little speculation.

The Wankawala Organization has been working with the building's owners to purchase the property since November. Wankawala's managing director finally spoke out to Philadelphia Magazine on a plan to convert the building into a moderately upscale hotel.

Despite Wankawala's optimism and their portfolio of corporate hotels, Councilman Mark Squilla remains apprehensive. His concerns are just. Wankawala has been leasing the Parker for the past four years, years that are marred by the hotel's troublesome reputation. The point being, if Wankawala wanted to cash in on the hotel's potential, why now? And if Wankawala simply wants to reopen the hotel, why not simply reopen it as it was? And what it was, at best, was a hostel.  

But there are other reasons Wankawala may be interested in finally maximizing the property's potential, even purchasing it. The city's Gayborhood is rapidly evolving. With new mixed use development transforming the East Chestnut Corridor and Midtown Village's 13th Street Strip expanding south, 13th and Spruce will inevitably become too valuable to remain vacant.

That in itself may not sit too easy with longtime residents and patrons of the Gayborhood. While this corner was once riddled with prostitutes and homeless people (often two-in-one living at the Parker), it was also the heart of the city's thriving LGBT community, and the Westbury was its Cheers. 

Seedy strip clubs have been replaced with daycare centers and local business relocated for fast food burritos, and some aren't thrilled with the change. Revitalizing the Spruce Parker Hotel is a necessity, but how it's reborn is an important part of what this neighborhood is about to become. Will a new boutique hotel be an asset to the city's still-relevant Gayborhood, or will it be a part of the area's continued gentrification?

Gay Hooters

Boxers PHL, the Gayborhood's answer to Hooters, has found success uncharacteristic of a city with a rigid stance against corporate chains. Sure, Boxers only has three locations - two in New York and one in Philadelphia - but unlike other small, regional chains, Boxers feels and behaves corporate. 

Philadelphia's gay community is far from small, but it's centralized and connected. From the Gayborhood's coffee shops to its bars and restaurants, Philadelphia's gay owned and operated businesses are places run by familiar faces. When the Westbury was forced to close following a fire at the Parker Hotel, many of its employees were offered shifts at other bars and restaurants in the neighborhood.

These businesses compete where they can, but first and foremost they serve the city's gay community. 

So it's not surprising that many were perplexed to see few to no familiar faces operating Boxers when it opened last fall. These weren't the bartenders and waiters we've come to know in this tight community. Were they beef shipped in from New York? Were they straight men cast for their bodies? 

Probably a little of both. 

What's most unusual is that it seems to be working. The bar is wildly popular with men and women. Has Philadelphia reached the tipping point in its Disneyfication that locals consider the Chili's of gay bars entertainment?

The worst part is, it's actually a really fun place and I can't explain why. Like the episode of Always Sunny where they gang visits Sudz, wanting to hate it, I found myself intoxicated by its cliche corporate antics. Even when you know it's fake, the scripted revelry taking place behind the bar at Boxers is a refreshing departure from the often cranky or unfriendly staff of our local pubs.

Flair works. The flirtatious winks and smiles from the Adonises reenacting cheesy scenes from Cocktail are as genuine as those from the girls pushing buffalo wings at Hooters, but smiling employees make smiling customers. 

Have Philadelphians grown tired of excusing curmudgeonly service as uniquely local charm, or has the city found enough New Philadelphians who don't remember a place that survived on the status quo, finally demanding and appreciating more. 

Perhaps our local bars will take a page or two from Boxers' success and why it works. It's a shame that a corporate chain - however small - has to lead the way, but chains succeed and multiply because they deliver consistency and know their markets. 

But Boxers hasn't been immune to its own missteps. A recent calendar campaign - exactly what you think it looks like - is currently raising funds for a noble charity that assists homeless LGBT youth, but only those in New York City. Likely a shortsighted error and part of a growing company's growing pains, it implies that the company hasn't embraced its neighborhood, but rather graced it with its presence. And it isn't the first time it's done so. Branding it "Boxers PHL" from day one brands it with the implication that we should be so lucky to have a gay bar from somewhere other than "PHL."

While our local pubs could perhaps learn a thing or two from why businesses like Boxers thrive, Boxers could stand to learn why bars like Woody's, Tavern on Camac, and Venture Inn have been around for so long. People like consistency, but they love loyalty. And Philadelphians, whether native or new, love this city too much to tolerate a business that continues to labor under the impression that our city is second-best, even to New York.

Fergie's Tower

Remember the Fergie Tower? U3 Venture's 30 story tower of Fergie, former member of Kids Incorporated and Wild Orchid? 

Just kidding. 

The Fergie Tower was/is a proposed apartment tower on Walnut Street between 12th and 13th, currently an EZ Lot that surrounds Fergie's Pub.

Goldenberg Group recently purchased the lot from U3 Ventures and plans to move forward with 300 apartments in a $100M project partnering with Houston-based Hines.

At 26 floors, the tower is ambitious, particularly east of Broad. Although it's not unheard of. The St. James on Washington Square is 45 stories with even more units. 

Between NREA's East Market under demolition/construction on the Girard Trust Block, Stantec's MIC Tower behind Lit Brothers, and Chinatown's potential Eastern Tower, things may soon be looking up in the eastern part of Center City.

And why not? Market East is finally offering the shopping it should, Midtown Village is proving itself an entertainment destination for everyone: People want to live in Center City.

Let's just hope Goldenberg doesn't mess with Fergie's classic Irish pub.

Collateral Damage

In an unfortunate series of events, Philadelphia's Gayborhood neighborhood was delivered several hits in the last month. The former Letto Deli, a unique piece of 50s era Americana, was demolished. iCandy was faced with the suspension of its liquor license. And sadly, it seems, Westbury will be closing.

After a fire broke out in the Spruce Parker Hotel, the city shut it down. The Westbury, a popular gay bar, was caught in the cross fire. Without a second exit, the bar was shut down along with the hotel. 

The city has been looking for a reason to shut down the Parker for years. The hotel is a remnant of a city that no longer exists. Some call it a hostel, others a whore house.

It's by-the-day, -week, and -month rates harken us back to a time when cities were more than Carrie Bradshaw and Co. brunching with their trikes in toe. Cities were places of diversity...ugly, ugly diversity.

To be fair, the Parker has become a venue for prostitutes, drugs abuse, suicide, and other ill repute. But it was also a place for those struggling to make ends meet, newcomers, and rent hikes. The Parker represents the ugly diversity that self ascribed champions of sympathy love to love but refuse to talk about: hardship, crime, and homelessness.

As unfortunate as it is, the Westbury is collateral damage. But the Parker offered something unique: affordable housing in a city that still needs it.

For all that's been said of the Parker, I'd love to see someone rattle off the crime rates at 13th and Spruce relative to any other corner of Center City, even Rittenhouse. The Parker was a flea-bag hotel, sure, but that's all it was. It was as much a place of struggle as it was for insidious activity. 

People only want to see the worst in others.

Liberalism can be a blindly double edged sword. While many who proclaim themselves champions of cause pat themselves on the back for cleaning up their neighborhoods, they've ignored those they've displaced with nowhere to go. We liberals view community gardens as improvements, but turn a blind eye to those who strive for a warm meal from McDonald's.

What sickens me most about the Parker's closure isn't the building's closure, it's the hypocrisy behind the unofficial campaign to eradicate the occasional warm bed for those accustomed to sleeping on the street.

The Gayborhood of all places is Center City's last vestige of cause. We should know better than anyone. When a kid is thrown out of a suburban home for coming out to his parents, the Parker was a bed. Now he or she has a steam vent along Market East. 

Progress isn't measured in the superficiality of new condos and hotels, it's measured in compassion. The Parker may have been a den of inequity, but no one stopped to question why that den existed. Its drug abuse, prostitution, and suicides weren't products of the hotel, they were products of our society. Now that the Parker is gone, those atrocities won't vanish, they'll be relinquished to the streets where they'll be ignored. 

We shouldn't have been campaigning to close the Parker, we should have been campaigning to end the reason the Parker served a need. 

13th and Spruce may find itself with a new hotel, market rate apartments, or a vacant building. But erasing the Parker from Philadelphia did nothing for those who needed it. At best it traded a rare alternative to a homeless shelter for boutique hotel rooms. At worst, those who resided at the Parker will be living on the streets in exchange for an abandoned high-rise. 

Think about that, then pat yourself on the back. As so-called "progress" transforms American cities with upscale apartments and trendy cafes, is it any wonder that homelessness is on the rise?

Saying Goodbye to Letto Deli

The days are numbered for Little Pete's iconic 18th and Chancellor location, so I decided to take a friend who was in town for the weekend. It seems that the city has taken note of the impending loss because the line to grab a table trailed down Chancellor Street.

It's a diner, they're all the same, and Midtown III is right up the street. Aside from Little Pete's decor and signage, the menu and building itself are nothing special. Architecturally speaking, Center City was hit with a bigger loss as demolition of the Gayborhood's former Letto Deli began today at 13th and Chancellor.

Since Letto's closure, a rumor circulated that it would become a Jose Garces joint. That would be fitting. The building's Mike Bradyian design would serve as a great home for restauranteurs seeking unique space. 

Not long ago this strip was lined with run of the mill hoagie shops, strip clubs, and XXX theaters. The Gayborhood's Midtown Village is now busting at the seams with new restaurants, particularly on 13th Street just south of Walnut. While the space may very well wind up serving as another restaurant, it's unlikely the new building will command the same amount of kitsch. 

Progress is great and this neighborhood is experiencing one of the greatest renaissances in Center City in decades. But there's something about artisanal pizza and bottomless mimosas that's just so...basic. 

Letto Deli itself was nothing remarkable, with the exception of decent, affordable sushi. But its home was as unique as the neighborhood once was. Midtown Village seems to be slowly licking the icing off the Gayborhood one business at a time, replacing it with that trendy fondant stuff that everyone picks off their cake. 

No renderings of the building's replacement have been released yet. The lot is deep and narrow so it may find itself with another one story building. But why bother? Especially when the original building looked as cool as Letto Deli.

Devil's Advocate: Spruce Parker Hotel

It's got two stars on Yelp, a whopping one and a half on TripAdvisor, but what may be surprising is that the tenants of the Spruce Parker Hotel at 13th and Spruce have access to the internet, or even know what it is. However, if you take the time to read any of the reviews you may see a wide gap between the urban legends that surround the place and those told by many who've stayed there.

Not long ago our inner cities were dotted with unassuming hotels that appealed to international backpackers or fresh faced high school graduates with no credit and minimum wage jobs. Something happened between Adventures in Babysitting and Sex and the City.

Old City's eclectic grit has been replaced with luxury lofts and parking lots for their tenants and the Furnished Room District's flop houses and dive bars were eradicated for the Pennsylvania Convention Center. Meanwhile, backpackers have uncovered chains of clean hostels while kids who want an affordable piece of the city have decided to watch it from the shores of their parents' basements.

It's good and bad. The Spruce Parker's popular perception is indicative of the polarized vision behind the New City, those who don't remember sacrificing luxury amenities for a piece of downtown, those who pride themselves on tolerance but pull their child a little closer when they see a transsexual walk past Nest...those who use brunch as a verb.

While there is some truth in the Spruce Parker's reputation, it's truth that lies in any hotel that doesn't require a credit card. Does it harbor prostitutes and drug dealers? Quite possibly. But so does a Motel 6 that sidles up to a truck stop. One that also houses travelers looking for a cheap room.

Throughout the Spruce Parker's storied history it's never been a source of pride, but its stable presence proves it serves a demand. Some of the negative attitude towards the hotel may be warranted, but reserve your judgments until you've been inside. Would the corner of 13th and Spruce be better if the hotel were apartments, condos, or dorms? Perhaps.

But would the corner of 13th and Walnut be safer without Woody's? Would the small streets between 12th and 13th be safer without iCandy, Tavern on Camac, and Voyeur? Dangerous things happen when you take property owners to task for evils that the city is responsible for enforcing.

Next time you cast stones from a nearby condo, ask yourself, are you concerned with the activity you think takes place in the Spruce Parker, or are you concerned with the fact that you simply don't like someone enjoying the city from a $59 a night bed? But more importantly, as you're licking the icing off the cake of the city, ask yourself what's next? The only thing under it is bread.

Move Over, Cupcakes

I thought donuts were the new cupcakes. Or maybe it was cereal. I was hoping it would be scrapple, but I'm going to let that dream go...for now.

Genalle and Rob Day have opened Go Popcorn on 12th Street near Chestnut after opening five successful Popcorn Company's in Pittsburgh, a welcome addition to the burgeoning Washington West/Gayborhood/Midtown Village neighborhood.

Gay Businesses Come Out

Philadelphia's impression outside Philadelphia leaves a lot to be desired. That's fine. We're Philadelphians. We're used to it, and we usually get a laugh out of the hate. We might be America's best kept secret. 

You think Philadelphia is that bad? Well, visit, then we can talk.

Nestled between DC and New York, too few bother to see what we're all about. I've had friends back in Virginia ask, "isn't it kind of a big Baltimore?" While I'd prefer "a small New York," Baltimore is nothing to scoff at, kind of like a DC cupcake with more icing and sprinkles.

But this isn't about Baltimore, New York, or DC.

This is about Philadelphia, and how all inclusively awesome we've become. On my way to Home Depot a woman in a burka was tailgating me. As much as her road rage annoyed me, I had an "a ha" moment, realizing she'd likely be profiled in New York, stopped and harassed for more than just a minor traffic violation.

Here, we're free to be. While our grab bag of religious, ethnic, racial, cultural, economic, and societal differences often sparks lively, sometimes offensively charged debates on message boards and blogs, we're free to practice what we want, how we want, and with whom we want.

About a year ago, the Human Rights Campaign placed Philadelphia at the top of its municipal equality index of LGBT equality. With Pennsylvania yet to legalize gay marriage, it says a lot that our municipality received a perfect score, with several bonus points that put us above San Francisco and New York.

This may come as no surprise to us. After all, our city is the only in the United States to brand its Gayborhood with rainbow street signs the way many designate their Chinatowns and Little Italys.

A night out in the Gayborhood might leave visitors wondering why. The "gay scene" in Philadelphia isn't as wild as smaller cities like DC or Portland. With about ten gay bars, some rarely crowded, you might think that Philadelphia is about as gay as Indianapolis...at least if you base inclusiveness solely on our ability to segregate where we drink.

That is where Philadelphia shines. Unlike conservative cities that isolate their gay bars and use them as defacto community centers, we need neither isolation nor therapy from a pint glass. America no longer calculates a city's gayness by its collection of gay bars, and Philadelphia helped make that happen.

We're integrated into mainstream society. Instead of sending a liaison to Harrisburg to help instruct our local Congress on issues in the community, we elected a gay Congressman, the first openly gay Congressman elected in the country.

While City Hall has embraced the gay community as much as any other, until recently the gay community has been relatively invisible on the street. In fact virtually every gay owned business in Washington Square West is fortressed behind a windowless façade.

As one of the first gay businesses to open its windows to the street, Uncles comes out as U-Bar

Many gay bars are still tucked in narrow alleys hidden from the street. Perhaps we never noticed what message this sent being that many of these establishments are so old.

In fact long before organized gay communities began emerging around the country, Philadelphia had already established an underground community in those same alleys, tucked behind theaters amid art clubs, catering to gay clientele in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries. 

It's not surprise that the Venture Inn is purportedly the oldest gay bar in operation in the country.

Venture Inn c.1900

Of course, tolerance waxed and waned throughout history and will likely continue to do so. While most people will always be reasonable, any kind of diversity will never be entirely free from bigotry.

For now, things are looking up. While gay men and women step out from the confines of our rainbow clad Gayborhood, businesses in the Gayborhood are coming out themselves.

Perhaps in an effort to combat, or at least coexist with the city's attempt to rebrand the Gayborhood as the more marketable "Midtown Village," Woody's, Icandy, and U-Bar have all replaced their unbranded walls with large windows showing off their renovations.

Improved menus at Tavern on Camac, The Westbury, and Venture Inn have proven that gay bars are more than just places to drink.

It's unfortunate that Philadelphia's gay owned businesses shrouded themselves for so long, particularly in understanding our trailblazing history.

The Midtown Village marketing campaign created an inadvertent, sometimes veiled prejudice towards long time neighborhood businesses. While not directly pointed at the city's gay community, the neighborhood's prior reputation as a slum paired with the fact that so many preexisting businesses were gay, created an inadvertent and false impression that Philadelphia's gay community was somehow seedier or less pronounced as the cushy enclaves of DuPont Circle or The Castro.

This is a misunderstanding. DC's DuPont Circle always struggled with a community association that never embraced its gay community and most of its nightlife has been pushed to the nether regions of the U Street Corridor, ripe with so much development it will likely continue to be pushed further east. Meanwhile San Francisco has become so expensive that its former gay oases serve tourists while locals play in Oakland.

Much the way our Chinatown remains largely authentic, Philadelphia's gay community has been active around Center City's Washington Square West for so long, we're more integrated into our city's soul, despite how it may look to visitors and new residents.

As more gay owned businesses open up to the street, the community's visible presence will increase. While anyone can enjoy the recent developments brought by the Midtown Village campaign, improving the image portrayed by gay owned businesses will hopefully tell gay visitors and locals alike that there's no reason to hide in Philadelphia.

The New Italian Market

Helen Urbinas's puff piece on Philly.com has managed to shove the proverbial stick further up the traditional Philadelphian's ass.

This benign article wasn't mean to spark debate, just fill space, but we all know that down the rabbit hole known as the internet, it takes about three posts on message boards or comments sections before the discussion turns racist.

The proposal and conversation is an irrelevant nonstarter. As far as I know, the only official designation of any neighborhood is its District or Ward.

"The Italian Market" is a website, not a legal demarcation.

People will call it what they call it. Developers attempted to rebrand the Gayborhood as Midtown Village, but people still call it the Gayborhood and will as long as Woody's continues to expand. Chinatown is full of Japanese, Korean, Malaysian, and Thai restaurants but will always be called Chinatown.  

It's real estate mumbo jumbo. Call it whatever you want: Little Mexico, Vietnamesetown, International Village, or The Italian Market. Who cares? As long as they keep selling live chicken and kangaroo meat, I'm happy it's there.

We're So Gay

Add Philadelphia to the top of another list. Mark Segal of the Philadelphia Gay News reported on a recent Human Rights Campaign assessment of America's most gay friendly cities. Of 137 cities, only Philadelphia scored a 100 on the base issues. Not New York. Not San Francisco. Only Philadelphia.

I suppose it's not surprising. The city funded the official recognition of the gay district by branding street signs with rainbows. Hell, most online maps either label the neighborhood near 13th and Walnut as the "Gayborhood," or at the very least a Google or Bing map search for the word will take you directly to Washington Square West. 

While New York City often claims the Gay Rights movement started with the Stonewall Riots in 1969, the first notable events actually began at Independence Mall on the 4th of July, four years prior.

And although Mayor Rizzo spent the following decade making "Atilla the Hun look like a faggot" (yes, he said that), the new century has seen Philadelphia host a cast of civic leaders that are not only tolerant, but embrace the gay community, often as advocates. In fact, it's hard to imagine a Philadelphia independent of Pennsylvania that wouldn't support marriage equality.

Philadelphia will soon be home to the nation's first government subsidized, gay-friendly senior living center. The Greater Philadelphia Tourism Marketing Corporation broke barriers with its "Get Your History Straight and Your Nightlife Gay" campaign, including commercials that aired on national television.

We're gay, Philadelphia. And that's a very, very good thing.

Revisting Market East

I was home for Christmas discussing Philadelphia with an uncle from Long Island, who travels to Philadelphia yearly for a convention, staying near Market East. I quickly found myself defending Philadelphia's uniquely local entertainment environment when I realized he was making the point I've been arguing since I first set foot on Market East.

I told him he couldn't judge Philadelphia by the area surrounding the major hotels, that you have to be willing to explore. My knee jerk defense mechanism kicked in when he said he liked Baltimore so much better. After all, talk about a city you have to explore before finding its gems.

Only you can't explore Baltimore on foot. If you're based at Inner Harbor, you have to get into a car and drive across the Badlands to find a truly Baltimorean experience. But that's when I realized, and my uncle validly pointed out, it isn't this native experience that conventioneers and most tourists are looking for. They're looking for what Inner Harbor offers and that is where Baltimore far exceeds Philadelphia.

They don't want the Trading Post or Passyunk Square. Most tourists want to see Independence Hall, a couple museums, and buy a snow globe at a gift shop while dining at a familiar restaurant on their way to an attraction they found in a brochure they picked up in the lobby of their hotel.

Our locally grown restaurants, quirky museums, and obscure historic landmarks do well enough on their own, catering to Philadelphians, suburbanites, and the seasoned tourists accustomed to wandering off the grid. But that leaves a large fraction of our tourism market with nothing to do but hurry past vacant retail spaces, take a few pictures in front of the Liberty Bell, and then retire to their hotel room at 12th and Market wondering why anyone likes Philadelphia.

I'm not sure where this home-grown resistance to commercial progress comes from. Philadelphia is a very proud city, but that same pride keeps visitors from understanding where that pride comes from. When you walk from the Marriott to Independence Hall you're greeted with a vacant mall and a poorly adorned street scape.

It's understandable that our average visitors from Oklahoma might go home questioning our city's historic heritage. While it's true that an illuminated orgy of commerce on Market East wouldn't pay tribute to our city's history, at least not in a conventional sense, it would stimulate the senses and encourage pedestrians to explore. Most tourists will continue to head straight to 5th Street, but they're willing to spend money along the way. And most importantly, a handful will drift north to Chinatown or south to the Gayborhood. This is the experience we want to convey. Unfortunately, because this main thoroughfare offers nothing, no one is going to assume that the side streets do.

While my uncle may be seeking a different source of pride, I want all visitors to be proud of this town. We have enough room to accommodate those looking for the familiar and those looking for something more unique. Market East is a blank canvas dying to offer that.

I want visitors to draw comparisons to Baltimore's Inner Harbor while saying, it's so much bigger, better, and more convenient. I want them to find themselves wandering into our real, local neighborhoods and that starts with a more appealing and convenient Market East fostering foot traffic.

Add to this lively environment the economic benefits of offering the creature comforts to those dying to pay for them and we might find ourselves with the cash to carry this experience to our forlorn Penn's Landing. This diamond in the rough to the locals who use it could be reborn as a destination for tourists and summertime sunbathers who accidentally find themselves there because Market East was so exciting they just didn't want to stop walking.