Mandalyns is a gay bar on Lansdown Road, a couple of minutes uphill from George Street, in a terrace called Fountain Buildings. Its own site calls it Bath's No1 gay bar, and it has run as an LGBTQ+ venue for over two decades.
The room is small and dark, with a proper dance floor at the back rather than a token bit of clear space. DJs, karaoke and themed nights fill much of the week, and the drag cabaret is what people travel in for, with touring queens on a stage that is a fraction of the size they play elsewhere. Tribute acts turn up too, and the bigger nights are ticketed in advance.
The crowd is mixed and mostly local, gay men and lesbians and the friends they came with, and it runs later than most of Bath, which shuts early. The bar also takes hen and stag bookings, so on some nights the room is more mixed than a gay bar elsewhere would be.
