New dance and drag club might be another sign of Edgewood Avenue revival

NonsenseATL and Wussy Mag have teamed up to open Lore, a new dance and drag club on Edgewood Avenue.

By definition, Lore is a body of traditions and knowledge held by a group. The name is fitting for the club, which celebrates queer culture, storied drag performers and the diverse community that has enlivened Edgewood Avenue for decades.

Before starting Wussy Mag in 2015, Jon Dean founded Legendary Children in 2013, a drag collective and photo arts project. The collective morphed into Wussy Events, which hosts parties and drag shows, and Wussy Mag, an online magazine that showcases LGBTQ culture and expression in the South.

NonsenseATL, founded by husband-and-wife team Kimberly Turner and Scott Lockhart, has been throwing dance parties under the NonsenseATL brand at venues across Atlanta since 2008. Turner, a.k.a “Kimber,” is a DJ. Lockhart, who hails from Australia, designs sound, lighting and effects inspired by clubs he’s visited around the globe.

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Credit: Ben Gray for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Credit: Ben Gray for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution

“Always in the back of my mind, we (Wussy) wanted a place that could be ours … a welcoming and inclusive space where we could have all of our shows and parties,” Dean said. “I knew Kimber and Scott and Nonsense and how much our audiences overlap, how complimentary our programming is, and thought what a cool thing it would be to work together.”

Dean successfully pitched the idea to Turner and Lockhart. The trio began looking for venue spaces about two years ago. The search brought them to other potential options in East Atlanta Village that “never quite felt right,” Dean said.

When Grant Henry, artist and owner of the kitschy Sister Louisa’s Church of the Living Room & Ping Pong Emporium (aka Church), decided to downsize his double-wide bar to return to its roots as a more intimate dive bar, it freed up a prime spot on Edgewood Avenue for Lore.

“It just felt like it was kind of kismet,” Dean said.

Lore joins a quadrifecta of venues catering to LGBTQ+ and alternative crowds on Edgewood Avenue including Sister Louisa’s, DJ Ree de la Vega’s Pisces Lounge (which opened in October 2024), Joystick Gamebar and Mambo Zombi.

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Edgewood Avenue has had an up-and-down history for nightlife. In 2017, The Jungle, a popular gay club that operated for 13 years and hosted drag shows, closed. In 2020, The Sound Table, an underground music venue that for 10 years often gathered queer audiences, shuttered. In 2023, Noni’s, a gritty Italian restaurant where many party promoters, including NonsenseATL and Wussy, held dances for 15 years, went dark.

Lore, and newly opened Pisces down the street, are helping to fill the void.

“It is really exciting to me to be a part of this new district that is forming … I mean, it’s always been there, but it’s continuing to evolve,” said Dean. “I hope that us being here helps the other businesses as well.”

Step inside Lore to be first greeted by Lola, a 4-foot wide, massive disco ball that hangs over the first-floor bar. Turner and Lockhart found Lola at a film studio auction after she had been in a Marvel television show in a roller rink scene.

Other small details — a bust of a koala, a tiger, a peacock — are present, each carrying their own lore, Turner said. The koala is for Australian Lockhart, the tiger was NonsenseATL’s first logo, the peacock feathers, historically, were a covert sign used to communicate one’s queerness.

Bordering the downstairs bar, a cabaret style cocktail lounge and small stage have a more relaxed vibe than upstairs. The second floor is a cavernous, long space with a stage at one end good for dancing crowds.

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On that stage is where Lore will revive some mythic drag shows that have, without consistent homes, been largely absent in recent years. Eddie Cheeseburger’s “The Other Show: Drag Cabaret” will be on Fridays, Brigitte Bidet’s “Tossed Salad” on Sundays and Taylor Alxndr’s “Amen: It’s a Drag Show” on Wednesdays.

“It’s exciting for them (the drag performers) to have a resurgence along with us,” Dean said.

On Saturdays, Lore will have an event called “Dayclubber” — blackout blinds will darken the space from 4 to 9 p.m. to produce a club environment before the sun has set. The normal nighttime sets follow until 3 a.m.

Credit: Ben Gray for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution

When Lore opens its full kitchen, likely later this year, Sundays will feature a drag brunch. “Crafty B****” will be a BYO arts and crafts social every other Tuesday night. DJs Vicki Powell, Brian Rojas and the Deep South ATL collective (which recently stopped throwing its longtime party “Sunday Service”) will now have a residency at Lore, hosting tea dances once a month on Saturday nights starting April 12.

One-off, special events are planned. A pitch-a-friend, IRL dating event will invite individuals to pitch their friends as datable material. In June a “M3GAN 2.0″ party will celebrate the sequel to the campy film about an AI doll.

“Lore is a place where friends can gather, where you can dance without pretension or being judged,” said Turner. “ … All ages, all races, all sexuality. Everybody just comes and melds together. That’s been our goal from the start … to create a really nice, safe space, where people will have a good time, be silly and creative and whimsical also.”