Friday, September 4, 2009

Times Square - Detroit, Michigan (Gay bar)

 
 Times Square (Now closed as gay bar) was located at 1431 Times Square in Detroit. I'm not sure what years it was open as a gay bar. I can remember it being quite popular for a few years. Rocko used to bar tend there. It was a dance bar. I had some good times there. Please post your stories about this bar.

31 comments:

  1. I think it opened around early 90's.. Place was pretty hip..I enjoyed it for a couple fo years..

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  2. Keith Foster opened this place and it marked a turning point in gay life in Detroit. Up until then, gay bars, if not completely annonymous, certainly hid behind solid walls. Times Square had big picture windows onto the street and was designed by a well-known, straight space planner that was a hot name in Birmingham design circles. I remember Keith getting all sorts of flack from city inspectors at a time when you couldn't get a business to open inside the city limits. It may not have lasted long but it was a real milestone for gay pride.

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  3. It's really sad that the downtown area just can't seem to hang onto a good gay bar. Times Square was FABULOUS while it lasted. Too bad...I really miss it.

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  4. This was a really fun bar for the few years it lasted. They would do lavish theme nights. One winter night they did a tropical theme and had boys set up on stages on the sidewalk outside the bar in the windows. From the street they were hidden by a canvas wall. The stage was tropical fruits/plants with hot male dancers. Was a upscale place and was first bar in Detroit that did not have a feeling like you had to enter in secret.

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  5. I remember going to this bar in the early 90's. This one of the gay bars in the area that didn't feel like a dive. It was always busy. So busy that one new year eve I had to spend must of the time in the bathroom because it was packed.

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  6. Kieth Foster opened this bar with a partner named Sandy. I don't know his last name, but he also owned Sandino's Flowers on Plymouth & Beech roads. After Keith passed, Sandy was able to keep the bar going for a couple of years. Sadly, Sandy passed soon after, and the bar reverted to Sandy's sister. She could never make a go of the business. Too bad, this was a real nice club.

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    Replies
    1. This was my Great Uncle Sandy. Sandino Ciccarelli.

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    2. Sandy's sister was able to eventually get the bar out of bank receivership, as my payments for work on checks reflected receivership.

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  7. This was the first gay bar I visited, when I moved to Detroit in 1991. It was routinely packed with a rather sophisticated crowd. I particularly remember going home with one of the bartenders. At some point they remodeled the adjoining space, and things started to unravel... as I recall, it eventually turned into a mostly-straight and mostly-black crowd, and I stopped going.

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    Replies
    1. Unraveled indeed, as in having a security guard at the front door, an airport style walk thru metal detector, and wanted posters posted at the entrance. Working on the building, I left before sundown whether the repairs were completed, or not.

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  8. It was there in 90/91 I know as that's when I remember going. We parked and I remember looking up and the tram was passing by above us. It was a really upscale looking club. Very trendy. I didn't really fit in with that crowd so we didn't stay long. Don't remember much about it just that the music was thumping and you could hear it out on the street. Lots of black and bluish lighting.

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  9. I saw Wayland Flowers and Madam perform there in the 90's. It was shortly before they closed and my only visit there. Ice sculptures everywhere and a harpist. It is a fond memory.

    Duane

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  10. They also had a great brunch on Sundays. They would put table out on the dance floor. Coffee came in a press pot. I miss Rocko - the love of my life. I used to beg to go to brunch at Timesquare and my ex would bitch 'you just wanna look at Rocko'. I have been saving myself for him for the past 20 years! Didn't this place also have a fire too. The designer was Ron Rea - also did Monterrey in Royal Oak. Talented guy.

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  18. I used to live in the Town Apartments in 1990 and 91 about 3 blocks from that bar. I would go there just about every weekend mostly because "Butch" was such a great deejay! Ed

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  19. Got fucked by the hot bartender on the dance floor after closing....hot as hell!

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  20. Loved going there until the Valet smashed my car into a light pole

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  21. I remember going there a couple of times in the early 90s. It was a high-tech dance bar. Popular with the young people.

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  22. Danced so many nights there!!! And it was the best! I was considered New Wave and would always go to City Club right around the corner but when I found this place! I never went back to City Club-
    It was a fun underground-like club - way better then Backstreet, or Maxie’s...
    Those were the days- loved seeing Blow wave and Tumbleweed, and Pilot Light, and Not Donna and Ray-on-
    Fun fun times

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    1. Oh my. Had a hot foursome at City Club with some out of towner's and a shy but HOT local from Backstreet (damn wish I would've keep him....engineer...hot blonde didn't talk much....need that type now!). Found a $50 bill outside in the snow when leaving. Felt like a real ho. Worth it though!

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  23. That was my first bar I went to on Friday October 11, 1991 ( yes national coming out Day) had a great time there and had a major Crush on the guy that is that the front door taking money. I think his name was Tony . I started there and I never went back . Lol ��

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  24. Time Square was a gay nightclub in downtown Detroit:
    - was open 1987 - 1995
    - Owners & partners Sandy Sicerelli & Keith Foster spared no expense to make it the most fabulous, open night club in the city of Detroit, which at the time had 40+ GBLT establishments.
    - The location was the old Bergmans Steak house from the 1920s which had caught fire. Noted interior architect Ron Ray converted the space to a 90s modern masterpiece (open space, loft-style accents, floor to ceiling windows "unashamedly inviting the outside into 'our world'"; unheard of in those forced "closeted", pre-Protease days of untreatable HIV/AIDS.
    - I remember volunteers gathering on weekend afternoons to help make AIDS Quilt panels for our community friends taken too soon; this is "where I came out".
    - then @ night WE CELEBRATED OUR LIVES, IN SPITE OF IT ALL!

    The most fabulous floral arrangements setup everywhere (Sandy was a florist),
    the hippest people "dressed 2 the 9s",
    the latest House & Club music & moves,
    & your were as apt to meet somebody in town from Paris, London, Berlin, New York, Atlanta, Chicago, as u were Detroit!

    THANKS FOR THE MEMORIES & "SAFEHOUSE", SANDY & KEITH! GONE BUT NEVER TO BE FORGOTTEN!

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  25. This was my Great Uncle Sandy. ** Sandino Ciccarelli

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  26. I worked there in the early 1990's for Sandy's sister keeping the building maintained. It had a lot of original plumbing that needed attention. I added a bathroom on the second floor and plumbing for a kitchen as there was intention of turning the upstairs office space into a loft. Tommy at the time was the manager, really nice guy and super handsome. The last job I did at Time Square Station was putting the new Formica countertop on the bar. Finishing up on the last day, we were hanging out enjoying coffee at the facelifted bar. It was my last time to TST, relocating to the west coast that weekend. After packing up my tools and saying goodbye, Annie Lenox's "Walking On Broken Glass" from the album DIVA, queued up on the streaming music playing. Halcyon days for sure. Nothing is forever.

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