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Swingin Richards Atlanta all-male, all-nude club to close Jan. 15


DerrickRigg

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2 hours ago, andymn said:

Got it — thanks.
 

So Swinging Richards is opening somewhere else this summer? Any idea where?

 

2 hours ago, andymn said:

Got it — thanks.
 

So Swinging Richards is opening somewhere else this summer? Any idea where?

The dancer indicated that it would be the same location.  Don't know how reliable this information is but he is a former dancer from SR.

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1 hour ago, tassojunior said:

St8 strip clubs do make a lot more money than gay ones. Ultimately real estate development makes ultimate value and in DC it's very fast to that highest value. (although we still have a few grand-fathered in straight strip clubs in high-priced areas). Secrets is now a 12-story condo.   

I was at Secrets about five or six years ago once or twice......I think it was on a road called Half St or something??.....front door faced west, I think, at the SW corner of the building?......that building is now completely gone????

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7 minutes ago, azdr0710 said:

I was at Secrets about five or six years ago once or twice......I think it was on a road called Half St or something??.....front door faced west, I think, at the SW corner of the building?......that building is now completely gone????

Correct...  1824 Half St SW.  (SouthWest represented what quadrant of the city the location is in.)

That building is now 100% gone.  Below are from August 2020 just a few months after it closed.

117225647_10158819670832009_384064047057

 

117522918_10158819670812009_744790684040

The new building is actually up, but I have not been out that way to grab a photo of the new condos that replaced it in a while.  There's nothing else like it left in DC unfortunately.  

 

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Secrets was indeed on Half Street SW from 2009 to 2020 after being forced to move from Its original O Street SE location to make room for the new Nationals baseball park.   It closed for good in 2020 as the “Buzzard Point” area underwent redevelopment in conjunction with construction of the new home of the DC United soccer team at Audi Field.  The building in which it was located was indeed torn down.

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I wonder if the green fire hydrant here is the same one as in RadioRob's picture just upthread??!!....some brick pavers were possibly added after this Google picture??

https://www.google.com/maps/@38.8673899,-77.0106556,3a,75y,53.22h,81.23t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sQjE4d98UbH-QPANjThUK_Q!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?hl=en

Edited by azdr0710
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22 hours ago, azdr0710 said:

I was at Secrets about five or six years ago once or twice......I think it was on a road called Half St or something??.....front door faced west, I think, at the SW corner of the building?......that building is now completely gone????

 

22 hours ago, RadioRob said:

Correct...  1824 Half St SW.  (SouthWest represented what quadrant of the city the location is in.)

That building is now 100% gone.  Below are from August 2020 just a few months after it closed.

117225647_10158819670832009_384064047057

 

117522918_10158819670812009_744790684040

The new building is actually up, but I have not been out that way to grab a photo of the new condos that replaced it in a while.  There's nothing else like it left in DC unfortunately.  

 

 Yes, the Zeigfields/Secrets building was torn down in August 2020 and construction started on the new condo which occupies the whole block immediately. It was also home in the 1970's to DC's first gay mega dance bar, The Pier 9, where there were phones on tables so you could call tables to flirt. Thee old Coast Guard HQ next door was gutted to a shell in 2018 and converted into 550 luxury units called The Watermark. I'm not sure the new building on Secret's site has a name yet but it's 350 units, also 12 stories (I was there a month ago) and here's the article and drawing of it. The red brick on the right of the new building is where Secrets was. (There's a couple dozen new buildings like these in that immediate area now and Audi soccer field is across the street from the old Secrets).  RIP

 

 

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Ahh, memories of O Street SE from the 1990s.  Residents of the new high-priced condo buildings wouldn't believe what that multi-block area used to look like.  I go to Nats Park a few times a year, and I'm still trying to determine what part of the park (3rd base?  the left outfield?) was the north stretch of O Street from S Capitol to Half Street SE.  The amount of splooge spilled (mine included) during those years would be quite something to quantify  🤔

Edited by bordeauxfan
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  • 1 month later...

I lived in ATL from 1986 until recently and practically grew up going to SR from when it first opened in the old Howard Johnsons - that building later became the Mouse House - through the move down the street and that area becoming gentrified. There was one dancer who was there for most of that time and I remember when the guy who now owns Johnson's was a dancer at SR, I do hope it reopens. 

I went to college in DC and remember the Pier very well. They would have college events on Saturday nights and slip promotional cards under our dorm room doors. Every straight college student in DC would be there. (For the younger set, the drinking age in DC was 18 until Oct 1982, at which time it went up one day at a time for the next three years. We could drink beer or wine only, so bars would use huge black magic markers to draw big black Xs between your thumb and index finger on each hand, We would go to the bathroom, take out the small tube of toothpaste we brought in and scrub off what we called the chicken marks.)

I also remember O St quite fondly. I would ride my bike there from the dorm once or twice a week. There would often be political VIPs looking for action, including the head of a well known PAC who seemed to live there. I also love the theater that was next door to the bathhouse, upstairs. I used to go there to see porn stars perform on Sunday afternoons and once met and fucked Joey Stefano in front of an auditorium full of men. 

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  • 3 weeks later...

So there was a rumor during closing weekend at Swinging Richards in January that a gay night at The Onyx stripclub off Cheshire Bridge Rd would hopefully get going this summer.  
 

Has there been any movement on that or was it just a pipe dream? 

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  • 4 weeks later...
20 hours ago, Leo Hammond said:

Just curious.. has the building been torn down or converted to a straight strip club?

I drive by every day. The building still stands. I haven’t driven by at night so I can’t say, but don’t doubt it’s been converted to anything yet. 

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  • 1 month later...

With Richards gone and rumors of a rebirth elsewhere in town seeming less and less likely, what has happened to all the hot male dancer talent in Atlanta?  Has BJ Roosters absorbed much of the roster list and clientele?  

Doesn’t sound like Matt from Johnson’s is going to come to Atl anytime soon since he has his hands full with the Dallas and Tampa Johnsons expansions.  
 

Seems like such a great time to capitalize after the void Richards left.  
 

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