Brighton Bar Closures 2026: R-Bar, Charles Street Tap, The Queery and The Font

Brighton and HoveBrighton NewsNewsNightlifeBusiness
Written By Tim Graichi Cucarella
Charles Street Tap and The Font pubs in Brighton, news banner: Brighton bars are closing

Charles Street Tap on Marine Parade and The Font on Union Street, two of the Brighton bars that have closed this year

ImJustBrighton is gay-owned, so this is not a story we are watching from the outside. Since the end of May, Brighton has lost The Queery, The Font, R-Bar and Charles Street Tap. This is our guide to each one: what it was, why it closed, what people have said, and which LGBTQ+ venues in Kemptown and beyond are still open.

THE LEDGER
R-Bar
Seafront bar on Marine Parade, sister to Club Revenge
Sunday 20 September 2026
21 years
Charles Street Tap
Marine Parade pub with cabaret, drag and craft beer
Late September 2026, as its lease ended
25 years
The Queery
Community cafe, bookshop and event space
Co-op voted to dissolve on 31 May 2026
Closed
The Font
Union Street pub in a former chapel, The Lanes
Final party on Sunday 19 July 2026
Now an O'Neill's
The Font was a general party pub rather than a dedicated LGBTQ+ venue. We include it because it is part of the same run of Brighton bar closures.

Sources: ImJustBrighton posts; Scenemag; Brighton and Hove News; Brighton Journal; Morning Advertiser; Greatest Hits Radio Sussex

R-Bar, Marine Parade: closed after 21 years

R-Bar closed for the last time on Sunday 20 September 2026. It was the seafront sister bar to Club Revenge, which is staying open. Brighton Journal describes it as a daytime spot and a pre-club stop before the club downstairs. Restaurant Brighton's guide calls it a two-level seafront bar with cheap drinks, popular with students.

“It is with enormous sadness that we announce today that R-Bar will be closing its doors permanently next month.”
R-BAR STATEMENT, 11 AUGUST

Scenemag reports the owners blamed rising business rates, rent, energy and stock costs, plus a cost-of-living crisis that has left people with less to spend on a night out. They said the bar was “no longer financially sustainable” despite efforts to adapt. Gaydio reports they were “absolutely devastated to be losing another LGBTQ+ venue in Brighton at a time when safe queer spaces are more important than ever.”

The lower floors of a brick and white block on Marine Parade in Brighton with a dark ground-floor bar fascia reading Bar Revenge and pink R logos
The Bar Revenge sign on Marine Parade in Brighton, September 2018, at the Old Steine end of the seafront.

R-Bar's closing message, reported by Scenemag, thanked staff, performers, DJs, promoters and customers. It said reactions to the closure showed that queer spaces can be a sanctuary, and that they are hard to replace once gone.

Charles Street Tap: closed after 25 years

Charles Street Tap, on Marine Parade right next to R-Bar, announced on 7 August that it would close when its lease ended in mid-September. The building is going back to its landlords. Scenemag says the pub opened in 2001, and Brighton and Hove News reports it closed about a week after R-Bar.

Charles Street Tap, a cream stone corner pub on Marine Parade in Brighton, with rainbow flags on the balcony and customers outside
Charles Street Tap on Marine Parade, Brighton, with rainbow flags along its first-floor balcony.

General manager Chris Marshall, who has run the venue for the last 20 years, said: “It breaks my heart to say goodbye.” He also said “the loss of one of our safe spaces should always be mourned”. Restaurant Brighton's guide calls it a staple of gay Brighton known as “The Queen of Craft”, with cabaret, DJ nights, drag bingo and quizzes. Visit Britain lists its drag quizzes and cabaret nights.

Unlike R-Bar, nobody has said money was the problem. The reason given was the lease.

The Queery: Brighton's queer cafe and bookshop closed in May

The Queery was a community cafe, bookshop and event space that hosted events, workshops, exhibitions and social gatherings. Visit Britain describes it as a volunteer-run bookshop and queer cafe.

Scenemag reports that members of the co-operative that ran it voted to dissolve it at their annual general meeting on 31 May 2026. The co-operative cited “long-term cultural, organisational and financial issues” that had been raised repeatedly and remained unresolved, and said wider economic pressure on community spaces made carrying on impossible. All event bookings were cancelled. The space will not reopen for trading, and the co-op is working with insolvency professionals so that items belonging to artists and makers can be returned.

Brighton Journal counts R-Bar as the third Brighton LGBTQ+ venue to close since spring, and names The Queery as one of the others.

The Font, Union Street: from chapel to O'Neill's

The white classical front of The Font pub on Union Street in The Lanes, Brighton, with its cream sign and a Roast Club board outside
The Font on Union Street in The Lanes, a former Nonconformist chapel.

The Font was not a dedicated LGBTQ+ venue. It was a busy party pub in a Grade II listed former chapel, and many of you told us what it meant to you. We posted about its final night, a closing party that ran from 10pm to 2am on Sunday 19 July.

Brighton and Hove News reports the building was a Nonconformist chapel from the late 17th century. It was rebuilt and enlarged in the early 19th century by Amon Wilds, and later used as a Presbyterian meeting house, which gave Meeting House Lane its name. It stopped being a place of worship in 1988 and became a pub. The Firkin brewery chain gave it the Font and Firkin name, and when the Firkin brand was dropped in 2001, it kept the name.

Its owner, Mitchells and Butlers, applied for planning permission to rebrand it as an O'Neill's Irish pub. The application covers a karaoke and DJ booth, new circular booths, new lighting, new flooring, two barrel-shaped O'Neill's signs and Guinness murals on the entrance doors. Permission was needed because the building is listed. We posted on 11 August that the Union Street venue was being converted into an O'Neill's.

What we posted and what you said

We covered the closures on our social channels as they happened. This is our 11 August Facebook post on R-Bar, Charles Street Tap and The Font.

Our Instagram post on The Font, titled “Gone but never forgotten”, has drawn more than 7,000 likes and a long comment thread. Here is the embed.

The comments split three ways. Some people remembered the pub fondly, from its Font and Firkin days in the 90s to its Tuesday night crowd, with one person calling it a safe and sacred space for the city's Mediterranean community. Some were unhappy that an O'Neill's is replacing it, with one calling it a downgrade and another asking why a converted church has never become a goth club. Others took a more practical view: buildings do not survive unless somebody looks after them, and change can be good for a city. We have paraphrased these and left out names.

Four closures, four different reasons

It is tempting to treat these as one story. The reasons given are not the same.

R-Bar
Costs. Rates, rent, energy and stock, plus customers spending less. “No longer financially sustainable.”
Charles Street Tap
The lease. It ended in mid-September and the building went back to the landlords.
The Queery
Organisation and money. The co-op cited unresolved cultural, organisational and financial issues.
The Font
A corporate rebrand. Mitchells and Butlers is turning it into an O'Neill's.

The wider pub trade is under strain too. Morning Advertiser reports data from June finding that one in six venues could fail within the next year without government help, and a survey by UKHospitality and other trade bodies found 23% of hospitality operators trading at a loss.

Who has said what

Here is what politicians and the council have said since the closures were announced.

11 AUG
MP Chris Ward called the R-Bar news “really sad” and said more needs to be done locally and nationally to support the night-time economy.
19 AUG
Ward met Kemptown venue owners. He called it an “emergency” and the closures a “wake-up call”. R-Bar managing director Steve Jones said the council and licensing authority face “a very clear choice”.
15 SEP
Ward raised the issue in the House of Commons, according to a political opinion piece in Sussex Express. He said: “There's an emergency facing Brighton's hospitality sector - and LGBTQ+ venues particular.”
18 SEP
Brighton and Hove Liberal Democrats backed a five-point plan from the Brighton LGBTQ+ Business Group, in another Sussex Express opinion piece. Spokesperson Robert Brown said: “The loss of LGBTQ+ venues cannot simply be accepted as inevitable.”
27 SEP
Council leader Bella Sankey called the closure of two LGBTQI+ venues “heart-breaking” but said she could not agree “the city's best days are behind us”. A government spokesperson pointed to 20% off business rates for pubs and bars next year.
2 OCT
Jones put five priorities to a full council meeting, and cabinet member David McGregor said he wanted to show “loud and proud” the positive impact of the LGBT scene on the city.

The council says a new night-time economy strategy is due later this year. Chris Ward and the Lib Dem pieces are political opinion, not neutral reporting.

LGBTQ+ venues still open in Brighton

R-Bar's own farewell statement urged people to keep using the venues that remain. It named eight. Descriptions and streets below are from Restaurant Brighton's guide unless we say otherwise, so check opening times with each venue.

Club Revenge

OLD STEINE
Brighton's long-running LGBTQ+ nightclub, which opened in 1991 and is due to celebrate its 35th anniversary later this year.
The front of Club Revenge on Old Steine in Brighton, with a blue poster reading Brighton's leading LGBTQ+ nightclub above a pink Club Revenge sign
Club Revenge on Old Steine, Brighton.

Managing director Steve Jones told Greatest Hits Radio Sussex that Revenge is looking at seated events, better use of its roof terrace, more opening days and improved production, lights and sound. No dates have been given. He said he wants the venue to feel “fresher and newer and exciting”.

Legends

MARINE PARADE
A queer bar with a large sea-view terrace and a basement club with resident nights.

The Queen's Arms

GEORGE STREET
A glittery, camp pub known for its pink exterior and drag acts.

Affinity Bar

ST JAMES'S STREET
A cocktail bar with drag cabaret and a mixed crowd. Booking is advised from Thursday to Sunday.

The Zone

ST JAMES'S STREET
Karaoke, cabaret and drink offers, with entertainment on most nights.

Bar Broadway

STEINE STREET
Drag, karaoke and drink deals at the entrance to the gay village.

The Bulldog

ST JAMES'S STREET
A karaoke and dancefloor pub described as a bedrock of Brighton's gay partying since 1979.

Marine Tavern

BROAD STREET
A small, cosy pub that goes big on entertainment.

The Actors

PRINCE'S STREET
A relaxed bar below the theatre at The Marlborough.

New places are opening too. Read our piece on The Birdcage, Kemptown's new cabaret and drag venue.

Why Kemptown matters

Brighton is often called the UK's unofficial LGBTQ+ capital, and the numbers back up Kemptown's place in that. Wikipedia's summary of the 2021 Census puts the share of people identifying as LGB+ at 11% across the city and 20.11% in the Kemptown area.

PEOPLE IDENTIFYING AS LGB+ IN THE 2021 CENSUS
Brighton and Hove, whole city
11%
Kemptown area
20.11%
Figures as summarised by Wikipedia from the 2021 Census.

The history runs deep. Brighton held its first Gay Pride Week in July 1973, launched by the Sussex Gay Liberation Front, and the Brighton Pride Weekend grew out of marches in 1991. Visit Britain says 2026 marks 35 years of Pride. See our Brighton Pride 2026 guide and more Brighton Pride coverage.

Where this came from

This is our own write-up, not a copy of any one report. The closure dates for The Font, R-Bar and Charles Street Tap come from our own posts and the reports credited above. Venue descriptions come from Restaurant Brighton's guide and Visit Britain. The reader reactions are from public comments on our own Instagram post, paraphrased.

Sources and further reading

More on LGBTQ+ life, Kemptown, Brighton nightlife, Brighton bars, Brighton pubs, The Lanes and Marine Parade on ImJustBrighton.

Read more from ImJustBrighton

Brighton Nightlife Guide 2026: Best Clubs, Bars and Late Night Spots

Brighton Pride 2026: Dates, Lineup, Tickets and Everything You Need to Know

Inside The Birdcage: Kemptown's new cabaret and drag venue

Little Jack Fuller's Kemptown: Two Workers Owed £10,529 After Sudden Closure Investigation

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