If you go out for a nice dinner or fancy cocktails on Valentine’s Day, you might think that downtown Madison has always been a wholesome, PG-rated place to be.
But did you know the city, especially the area known as First Settlement District, has a kinky past? Read on to learn about the places and people that gave Madison its sexy reputation in the Midwest, and how that ethos is continuing today.
Madison’s Red Light District
These days, the 100 block of East Main Street is full of nice restaurants like the Tipsy Cow and Argus BarGrille. But in the 1970s it attracted entertainment of a different kind. The Dangle Club and the Mustang Inn were considered to be Ground Zero for Madison’s Red Light District, with strippers at the Dangle and topless bartenders at the Mustang. Down the street, This Is Heaven offered sauna massages for both “male and female clients.”
King Street had its own porn shop, and residents remember that the streets were full of sex workers and their customers, “a freewheeling open-air market of streetwalkers and pimps.” In the ‘80s, neighborhood residents got sick of all the crime and worked with police to drive out the prostitutes and unsavory establishments, paving the way for the First Settlement District we know today.
Hotel Washington
The story of Madison’s LGBTQ+ history can’t be told without the Hotel Washington. The development was not only a 22-room residential hotel, but considered the epicenter of Madison’s LGBTQ+ community at the time. It included the Club de Wash music club, the Barber’s Closet speakeasy (accessible only through a secret door), and a masculine gay bar in the basement known as Rod’s.
Rod’s was named after Rodney Scheel, a prominent gay rights activist in Madison who opened Madison’s first out gay bar, The Back Door in 1972, and bought Hotel Washington in 1975. Scheel died in 1990, and the hotel burned down in 1996.
Cardinal Bar
Known for “salsa, sexiness and social conscience,” the Cardinal Bar on Wilson Street became another gay-friendly spot after Ricardo Gonzalez leased and ran it from 1974 to 2003. Known in particular as a dance bar with an emphasis on jazz and Latin music, the Cardinal was a place that could host a “leather and lace” fetish party one night and a political fundraiser the next. The Cardinal was reborn in 2023 for a new generation of sex-positive Madisonians, including those fetish nights.
Where To Get Kinky in 2026
While Madison may look different today, its kinky heart still beats strong. On the City Cast Madison podcast today, local consent advocate and kink expert Lili Luxe talks to host Bianca Martin about places in Madison that are still kink-friendly, and what attracts people to the scene.
