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• Best Gay-Friendly Bar

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Chester Street Bar (Tom Root, Buzz photographer)

Runners-up

Boltini Lounge 211 N. Neil St. # 1, C. 378-8001
Murphy’s Pub 604 E. Green St., C. 352-7275
See complete Best of CU results

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Chester Street »
Address: 63-65 Chester St. Champaign, IL 61820
Phone: (217) 356-5607
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Lively music, dancing and drag shows are only part of what one may experience at Chester Street Bar (C-Street). Although C-Street is the proclaimed winner of “Most Gay-Friendly Bar,” C-Street’s nightly crowd is full of diversity.

“Our crowd is probably 50% straight, 50% gay easily,” said Assistant Manager Tommy Williams.

Originally, according to Williams, the building where C-Street stands was a carriage house during the small pox epidemic and had included a morgue inside. Afterwards, the building became Chances Are, where REO Speedwagon and Head East used to perform live.

According to Williams, the current owner, Ed Piraino, opened the bar about 26 years ago.

“Ed used to own a different bar, and it broke down ... he wanted to open another gay bar in Champaign,” said Williams. “[Ed] wanted to have his own gay bar where everyone was safe and comfortable.”

Although C-Street was “completely gay way back in the ’80s,” according to Williams, it is not advertised as a gay bar. It’s more of a “mixture” of people now.

“We have a zero-tolerance policy,” said Williams. “We don’t accept anyone messing with anyone else of race, color, sexual orientation. We’ve kicked out gay people, straight people, black people, white people.”

As of right now, the 15-person staff of C-Street is at least half straight, according to Williams.

Not only does C-Street offer diversity of race, sexual orientation and ethnicity, but also of age.

“You get people that are 60, 70 coming out to dance next to 19-year-olds,” said Williams. “You never know what you’re going to see.”

The diversity of C-Street has spread among campus life as well.

“We’re the number one bar to host exchanges for the Greek system,” said Williams.

However, according to Williams, a lot of people make assumptions about the bar.

“We’re definitely known as the ‘gay bar,’” said Williams. “A lot of people don’t come here because they assume that it’s the gay bar.”

Although C-Street is gay-friendly and was bought by Piraino to have a comfortable place for gay people to go, it is now a bar full of people from all walks of life.