Gay Guide to Brighton
Brighton holds the densest queer population in Britain. In the most recent census the Kemptown area returned just over twenty percent of residents identifying as LGB+, the highest of any small area in the United Kingdom. That is not a recent development; the town was a refuge long before 1967. It is also where Trans Pride began: founded here in 2013, it was the first trans-specific Pride anywhere in Europe and still runs on volunteers and donations rather than headline sponsors, which is a large part of why people travel for it.
Kemptown is the district and St James's Street is its spine. The Camelford Arms, Bulldog, Queens Arms, Kemptown Klub, Affinity, Bar Broadway and The Lock-In run along it or just off it, Legends combines a bar, a club and a hotel in one seafront building, and Subline handles the cruisier basement end.
Revenge has been the club on the seafront for decades. The Marlborough is a pub with a genuine queer theatre upstairs rather than a function room, Metrodeco covers the civilized daytime version, and The Sauna Brighton rounds it out.
Trans Pride Brighton takes a July weekend and Brighton Pride takes the August bank holiday on Preston Park, one of the largest in the country. Brighton Bear Weekend adds a third date, and the Clare Project has been doing trans support work here since long before any of this was fashionable.
Brighton is an hour from London by train, which is why a great many people arrive for the day and leave three days later. The beach is pebbles rather than sand, the nudist stretch is east past the Marina, and the whole city is walkable.