As I walk up Davie street I am immediately overcome by the life it seems to possess. The streets feel alive with color and vibrancy that is reflected in the laughs of couples going for a morning stroll and the live music from the local cafe. The roads are lined with rainbow flags that match those in the corners of every store window. There is a sense of joy unlike anywhere else I have experienced in Vancouver. Davie Village, as many call it, is a neighbor in the West End of Vancouver which is often considered the heart of the LGBTQ2IA+ community in our city.
Davie Street Pride Parade 2014 (Darryl Dyck/THE CANADIAN PRESS)
There goes the gayborhood? UBC prof says Davie Street changing, not dying | CTV News
The history of Davie Village is not as joyous as the area may appear today. In the 1940s the West End transformed from a suburban to more urban setting with small rooming houses that due to low prices attracted many young gay men to the area. However, during this time, they faced extreme prejudice and although a community was forming almost all gatherings were under the radar and out of the public eye. It was not until the 70s and 80s, following the decriminalization of homosexuality in 1969, that Davie Street as I know it today began to fully form.
First Pride in Vancouver 1981- BC Gay and Lesbian Archives
Davie Street Village • Vancouver Heritage Foundation
The area became not only a safe haven for queer people but also began to create a unique place of belonging. Before I was born my Dads lived in the West End just off of Davie Street for many years. While I was growing up, they often said they wanted to move back there someday. This was the place where they had met my moms and finally been able to freely express themselves. Whenever we walked down Davie Street they would point out the pub where they would go to celebrate with their Queer Soccer team or the sign for drag queen bingo night at the burger joint on the corner. As a kid this sort of representation did not even occur to me as out of the ordinary but as the founder of the Gay and Lesbian Archives, Ron Dutton said “The community [began] to self-identify with this place as ‘their territory’ – it becomes a genuine community instead of a geographic place they live in.” LGBTQ / Gay History in Canada – Davie Village
Davie Village is such an important place for the LGBTQ2IA+ community because over the last century they turned it into a unique space of belonging and representation that many of them had never experienced before. Something as simple as a rainbow flag in a store window or lining the street acknowledges that this is their own created place of acceptance. For my Dads, living in Davie Village gave them the opportunity to build their own community and eventually family that they have not found anywhere else in Vancouver. Although I have walked down Davie street at least a hundred times in my life I never understood the full impact of how this community of acceptance affected even the lives of those closest to me. The joy that I find so apparent in the street is rooted in a long history of fighting for acceptance but also the triumph of finally finding a place of belonging and village for celebration.