“After I left Victor Drai’s Liaison, I said, ‘I’m never going to do anything gay until there’s an actual need and I find the right place with the right spot,’ ” he says. “I felt like we needed a space that’s in the middle and center of everything,” he explains, “because the old gay concepts were in the dark and hidden from the mainstream.”Īnd so Cordova launched the “Closet Sundays” gay night at Cathouse at Luxor over a decade ago, the first of its kind on the Strip, before being recruited by Light Group to do the same at Revolution at The Mirage.įrom there, he’d work with Bare Pool, Share Nightclub and Victor Drai’s Liaison Nightclub at Bally’s, the first gay nightclub in a casino on the Strip.Įventually, though, Cordova wanted his own place. Since relocating to Vegas from his native Arizona in 2008 and immersing himself in the local gay scene, he sought to bring gay nightlife to the Strip and then other parts of town where it had little presence previously. While those spots have played an important, enduring role in the city’s gay community - even if, like Gipsy, they no longer exist - Cordova has aspired for something different, something a bit more mainstream. It’s long been a rough part of town with a nickname rougher still.įor decades, Las Vegas’ gay nightlife scene has largely been synonymous with a gritty stretch of Paradise Avenue and Naples Drive colloquially known as the “Fruit Loop,” a questionably titled mini-district checkered with seminal clubs of the past and present like FreeZone, Piranha Nightclub and Gipsy. I’ve dreamt about having a space where we can grow and we can be proud.” It’s definitely a milestone - and not just for me, for the entire community. “For me, it’s creating a gayborhood within the neighborhood,” he explains. Recently, he signed the lease on a 7,000-square-foot property on nearby Main Street that he’s going to turn into Queen Bar, a drag bar scheduled to open later in the year. The success of The Garden has already gotten Cordova thinking beyond the room in which he currently sits. “I don’t think it would have been happening in Vegas between five and 10 years ago.”
“Sometimes you’ll see three generations of a family sitting there,” he notes, “which is interesting for any bar or restaurant, but especially for an LGBTQ bar and restaurant, where you can have a member of the community, a parent or two parents and a grandparent, even. Matt Hayes, a California native and Garden regular, has experienced as much firsthand. “And that means a lot, because what I’m hearing from those guests is that they now have more of an understanding about the community because they got to spend time with the people in the community at a fun place.” “We’re seeing local people coming out who are not necessarily a part of the gay community,” says Coco Montrese, a veteran drag queen, former Miss Gay America and “RuPaul’s DragRace” contestant who performs at The Garden. Its weekend drag queen brunches are especially popular, regularly selling out two shows on both Saturdays and Sundays, attracting large, diverse crowds in a vibrant melting pot. Since opening a year ago in the Arts District, The Garden Las Vegas has become one of the hottest gay bars in the city - Cher has even dropped by. “This place was just a shell,” says the owner of The Garden Las Vegas, surveying his club on a recent weekday, his newly blond hair bright as the afternoon sun.
Not long ago this now-happening nightspot and restaurant, saturated in verdant shades, was drab and outdated, a dormant seed in need of some serious watering, waiting to blossom. Baskow/Las Vegas Review-Journal) gray to green the room has gone.
Symone, Season 13 winner of "RuPaul's Drag Race," is with owner Eduardo Cordova on the red carpet as alternative lifestyle bar The Garden celebrates its one year anniversary on Friday, June 11, 2021, in Las Vegas.