Meet the Man Behind Tight End, Denver’s Only Gay Sports BarĪ glow dance party at DV8.8 LGBTQ-Owned Spots in Denver for Sipping, Supping, and Celebrating.As a result, the bar became a natural progression that echoed their personal journeys. Both individuals identify as queer, and Gunnels only came out fully in the last few years. That’s when the designation became such an important facet of their lives that not doing it felt disingenuous to them. While the distillery has always been a community gathering place, it wasn’t originally branded as a “queer bar.” Concerned about rainbow capitalism-the commercialization and commodification of LGBTQ movements-Gunnels and Tilley shied away from declaring DV8 as a queer space until last year. With sex-positive, kink-themed events sprinkled throughout its calendar-think: glow paint dance parties and circus shows-some nights lean more toward the risqué than others. As the distillery’s product line of rice-based bourbons, gin, and vodkas grows, so does the business’s mission to generate a safe, inclusive atmosphere where “community can flourish without judgement,” according to Tilley.
When Rawley Gunnels and Johnathan Tilley founded Boulder’s DV8 Distilling in 2016, they set out to craft crave-worthy gluten-free spirits and carve out a space for the neighborhood.
