7 Astounding Yet True Facts About the Lusty Lady

FACT: Formerly the Sultan Theater, Seattle's Lusty Lady is the original Lusty Lady. The one in San Francisco is the one that unionized and, eventually, became a worker-owned co-op. Seattle? Not a co-op. On the plus side, it's not owned by the Colacurcio family, either.

FACT: The $20 that buys a 2-minute lap dance at Déjà Vu gets you 20 minutes of glassed-in nudity at the Lusty Lady. One quarter keeps a peep show window open for just 15 seconds. (Allegedly. Last time we were there, we weren't scoping out our watch.)

FACT: One locally famous alumna: Shannon Kringen, a.k.a. the Goddess Kring, a.k.a. "the happiest naked person on cable." Kringen danced at the Lusty Lady for two years until they fired her for waxing rubenesque. Now you can see her naked for free on community access TV (10:30 Monday nights).

FACT: Another famous alumna: Mistress Matisse, who danced under the stage name Marcella. She liked the steady income—they pay an hourly wage—but not the behind-the-scenes lesbian drama (or the early-morning shifts). Now you can hire her for far more specialized services than stage nudity.

FACT: Two alumna have written books about their time at the Lusty Lady: Elisabeth Eaves, who danced under the name Leila and wrote the book Bare: The Naked Truth About Stripping. Eaves also danced at Rick's, but didn't care for the "sinister vibe." Erika Langley, a.k.a. Virginia, still danced at the Lusty Lady when she published the book The Lusty Lady in 1997, a memoir and collection of photos.

FACT: Though most days the women at the club (even in the Private Pleasures booth) are behind glass, there's live (semi-)nude interaction with them one day a year: Playday. As Langley writes, it's "the fabled one day a year when the dancers take over the club." Go-go dancing, private dancing, slave training, panty auctions—everything they collect is divided among everyone who worked that day and it becomes the dancers' XXXmas bonus.

FACT: Enough about the inside. The outside, of course, is justly famous for its unending stream of bawdy puns on the marquee (if your submission ends up on the marquee, you win a t-shirt—or a thong). It's also received national attention because the Four Seasons and Harbor Steps bought the air rights over the building when the owners declined to sell the whole thing. This bit of old(ish) Seattle remains unvanished, like Edith Macefield's house in Ballard, collecting glistening new Seattle architecture around it like grit in an oyster spurs a pearl.

The photo in this post? "Indiana Jones and....." by Ryan Holloway, from our Flickr pool. Thanks! Want more marquees? Check the Lusty Lady fan club on Flickr.