Disco chicago1/4/2024 In business since 2010, Chicago Detours is a passionate team of educators, historians and storytellers. – Alex Bean, Content Manager and Tour Guide We’re in an era of rooftop bars and DJs for now. Even more recently, the proliferation of home entertainment options have dramatically cut into anything but the biggest of live entertainment options.Ĭonsidering all that, one cannot expect a revival of the mid-century aesthetic in Chicago’s nightlife history. The decades since have also seen the rise of suburbanization, which dilutes the potential audience. Some of this is due to cultural changes, like the London House closing as jazz went out of style. Supper clubs, small music venues and gentlemen’s clubs have fallen out of the mainstream since the ’60s. If anything, private clubs like that are more likely to recall their staid and conservative origins in the Gilded Age. Private clubs like the Tavern Club are still around, but I doubt many people will find a Union League Club soirée to be very risqué. Photo courtesy of Happy Medium Ventures.Ĭlubs like those we’ve looked back on here are hard to find these days in Chicago. Stopping by their airport venue is like taking a step back into Chicago nightlife history.Ī Different Era in Chicago Nightlife HistoryĪ rollicking Mister Kelly’s in the heyday of Chicago nightlife history. The Gaslight Club left downtown in the ’80s, but still operates out at O’Hare. The Playboy Club, which saw 130K guests per quarter in its first years, eventually closed in 1984. That being said, it actually outlasted Hefner’s creation in Chicago nightlife history. More talented they may have been, but The Gaslight Club was perpetually in Playboy’s shadow. We wore French-cut velvet corsets, modeled after the original nineteenth-century Victorian undergarments, trimmed in sequins.” – Mary E. Really, really well… Bunnies were eye candy in bowties. The bunnies had their tails and their ears and their trays of drinks. Any Gaslight Girl, and a whole lot of keyholders, will tell you that we were better – much better – than the bunnies. “We were the Other Club, mentioned in the same breath as Chicago’s Playboy Club. Speaking of, there’s apparently some long-simmering ill feeling between the Gaslight Girls and the Bunnies. Belle epoque Paris inspired the atmosphere, especially the Gaslight Girls’ outfits and revues. The club’s luxurious interior design stayed consistent across several different downtown locations. Founded in 1953, the Gaslight Club set the template for the va-va-voom aesthetic and atmosphere that Playboy made so famous. The famous Playboy Club (which opened on the Mag Mile in 1960) and its iconic Bunny outfits were both inspired by a haunt Hef knew well: The Gaslight Club. Hugh Hefner was many things, but original was not one of them. So, yes, USO tours in Vietnam are not typically considered part of Chicago nightlife history, but there’s only so many accessible photos.
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