BY SARA KIESLER for WEEKLY VOLCANO | 9/25/2026
Local businesses along South Tacoma Way host drag bingo, queer karaoke, and more.
At a time in our country’s history when many LGBTQ people are seeking community and belonging to stay safe, South Tacoma has blossomed into the “gayberhood” for the City of Destiny.
From Juniper Botanical Bar to Mule Tavern to Howdy Bagel, South Tacoma Way offers more than rainbow flags to signal its welcoming nature. On any given day, you can find Drag Bingo, QueerPong, a bagel business wall plastered with “Y’all Means All,” and spaces designed to celebrate the beautiful love and joy of the queer community.
“I moved to South Tacoma eight years ago, and I love to see how it’s grown and changed,” said drag performer Bobbi Jo Blessings, whose given name is Kerry Neisen. “It’s just become the epicenter of queer art and queer performance.”
Blessings is working with Al McKee, owner of Juniper, to organize South Tacoma’s first Pride parade in 2027 if permitting and planning come through.
The parade plan follows a Pride event along South Tacoma Way this summer, with participating businesses including Howdy, Juniper, The Mule, Tacoma Drag Market, and Real Art Tacoma. Tacoma ranked No. 4 among the nation’s most LGBTQ-friendly cities in a 2026 ConsumerAffairs analysis, and Blessings believes the city is big enough to host two Pride events.
“Pride brings money to those businesses downtown, so I thought, ‘Well, South Tacoma is doing this year-round and should also have that support, recognition, and fun,’” Blessings said.
Howdy Bagel owner Daniel Blagovich founded the popular schmear and bagel shop with his husband Jake, who has since passed. Growing up in religious places where it wasn’t safe to be out, he and Jake were intentional about being out and loud with slogans like “Y’all Means All” to encourage people to not have to hide their authentic selves.
“It’s really special to see younger queer folks stepping into the space,” Blagovich said. “I’ve had a lot of sweet interactions with parents of queer youth who say, ‘Thanks for making this a safe space. We don’t have a lot of these in Tacoma.’ It’s special and humbling.”
As someone who also lives in South Tacoma, I’ve heard neighbors who don’t think it’s safe or refer to it as “the ghetto,” a racist caricature that does not reflect the community-centric camaraderie of the neighborhood. If anything, becoming the “gayberhood” signals gentrification of the historically marginalized community.
It’s important for queer folks to have intentional places to go when states around the country are passing or attempting to pass laws that restrict freedoms for queer people, including the two anti-LGBTQ initiatives on the ballot in Washington state this November.
McKee sees Juniper as an antidote to what they describe as an increasingly isolated culture, where social media and AI can replace face-to-face connection. Though Juniper is a bar, it is open to youth until 9 p.m. and is intentionally creating a bright, less divey third space by offering games, a location to host a silent book club, queer cribbage, karaoke, dance parties, and everything in between.
As McKee is also an anti-diet dietitian who counsels queer people on nutrition, body liberation, and finding balance in their lives, Juniper is its own form of holistic healing for the community.
“I go home and cry almost every day from the stories customers share about how they’ve been waiting for a space like this: just being able to be out in a public space and feel safe,” they said. “It’s really special to me that some of our elder queers have come in crying and being like, ‘I wish I had this when I was younger.’”
On South Tacoma Way, that wish is becoming more tangible as business support for LGBTQ+ folks continues to grow.
