Tickets for this Halloween weekend’s biggest queer party in SF are still up for grabs, btw.
San Francisco has long existed as the gay mecca of the world, more or less for decades. SF’s politics — counter cultures, technologies, subsets of the arts, etc. — have always been influenced by LGBTQIA+ folks. As the saying goes, “as California goes, so goes the nation”; one could line-edit that to read “as [San Francisco] goes, so goes California… [and then the nation.]” And the same can be said about the city’s nightlife landscape.
Over the past ten years, Electroluxx, ostensibly the city’s most beloved and impactful production company behind a slew of well-known parties, has grown from humble beginnings to throwing one of the largest Halloween queer parties anywhere along the west coast: Ghost Palace.
“We were a group of guys that wanted to add something new and fun to the nightlife experience in San Francisco,” co-founder and co-producer Elliott C. Nathan told Underscore earlier this year, waxing nostalgic on the “Sunday Mass” evening parties held at The Chapel on Valencia Street over a decade ago.
Per Nathan, those early festivities allowed the co-founders to test and iterate certain formats and styles, though never losing its bootstrap charm— “we would push all the tables and chairs against one wall and created a makeshift DJ table with some paintings as the backdrop and threw a dance party, we would use anything we could around us to just make it work.”
That same energy has gone toward putting together Ghost Palace, which, now in its second year, is among the collective’s largest nightlife events they throw annually and the only queer private party to take over SF’s famous Palace of Fine Arts.
Elecroluxx’s Ghost Palace represents a nexus of Bay Area creativity. This weekend —Saturday night, btw! — a long, long (long) list of DJs, artists, dancers, and other folks who occupy creative niches will fill the 140,000-square-foot venue. Attendees of the party can navigate an Avatar-like landscape of glow-in-the-dark artificial flora, neon signage, psychedelic art set in both dancing and more conversational areas, and so much more.
(The three-person group, Yacht, will combine their multi-dimensional artistry to take partygoers on a journey all night long; “room takeovers,” which will be like pop-up galleries, are expected to punctuate the venue.)
Among that impressive roster, notable SF pillars of nightlife are also expected to showcase their talents … and, as is the case for some, their iconic drag personage.
“As a local drag queen, philanthropist, activist, mother, and DJ, I’ve dedicated myself to my craft and community,” San Francisco-based drag queen and serial community organizer Juanita MORE! Tell Underscore. “I’ve helped raise over a million dollars for our city’s most impactful nonprofit organizations over the past 30 years, and my relationship collaborating with Electoluxx events has incredible meaning to me.”
MORE! will be on the decks with amazing DJs all night — “My clutch will be packed full of house, techno, and disco music to make everyone shake their groove thing on the dance floor.
Her couturier and longtime costume collaborator, Mr. David Glamamore, has helped make the high-fashion Halloween costume she will be wearing. As for on-the-spot requests? “Sorry, that’s not happening.”
What will be happening this weekend, however, is a balm of queer creativity enveloping one of San Francisco’s most prominent, synonymous venues — a hug of sorts that will last far longer than when Halloween weekend ends.
// Last Call tickets for Ghost Palace (10/26 9 p.m. to 2 a.m., 3601 Lyon Street) aer still on sale, here.
