From the 80’s several studies have demonstrated how the settlement and development of “gay villages” or GLBT neighborhoods, in specific parts of urban contexts around the world (but mostly in North America and Europe), have given space to new forms of living the city and to promote liveliness to particular urban spaces, more or less open to the rest of the cities in which they are integrated. With similarities with many other areas that have been the main drivers of urban revitalization of inner-cities, like cultural and creative quarters or multicultural spaces, these areas distinguish for the social practices of their users and inhabitants, the specificities of their economic activity, or their contribute to creativity or social integration. More than community ghettos, these areas have been characterized by the coexistence of diverse lifestyles, trajectories and identities, but also by the contribution of GLBT people to the gentrification of these areas through their strong commercial, residential and symbolic presence. Drawing on an empirical work developed in Lisbon (Príncipe Real district) and Madrid (Chueca district), based on in-depth interviews to GLBT residents and participant observation in these two areas, the paper characterizes the main evolutionary trajectories and specificities of these two quarters. An analysis is made confronting the characteristics and contingencies of these areas with other cases previously studied in literature, suggesting the existence of considerable differences in relation to them and suggesting evidence of important specificities which could represent a “South European” approach to the reality of “Gay Villages”.

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Gay villages; Urban; City of quarters; GLBT; Gentrification; Gaytrification; Lisbon, Madrid