Gay Travel Guide Antwerp

About Antwerp and its gay life

Antwerpen – home of painter Peter Paul Rubens, the Antwerp Six fashion designers, half a million residents and more than 1500 diamond trading companies – has many facets. It can be glamourous and it can be run-down, it can be trashy and it can be sophisticated, it can be grey, gloomy, colourful, arty, ... The same applies to the gay scene in Antwerp.

In the past, the gay main street used to be Van Schoonhovenstraat. Now this area has a rather bad reputation for its old-fashioned bars and its sometimes sad, sometimes trashy atmosphere. Don't judge Antwerp and its gay scene by just that street.

The club Red & Blue, for instance, is famous among gay clubbers from all over Belgium and Netherlands and even from West Germany and Northern France.

For gay men with a passion for SM and fetish Antwerp has been a top destination for many years, especially because of its flagship club, The Boots.

The gay cafes in Antwerp have a cosmopolitan atmosphere, and the annual Navigaytion party event with 20 DJs on 10 party boats attracts 2000 party animals from all over Europe. The biggest gay event ever in Antwerp, though, has been the EuroGames in July 2007.