Nicolai Street Clubhouse

Awash with a light that cinematographers sometimes call "bastard amber," Nicolai Street Clubhouse is a glowing cube of weathered beer advertisements anchoring an abandoned corner in the Northwest Industrial District. If you're in the neighborhood (perhaps walking off an existential crisis), look for a dancer hunched over a curbside table, smoking feverishly before she has to get back on the small corner stage in front of a crowd of rowdy longshoremen. Score some free popcorn, set up in front of one of the many video poker machines, and chug a few light beers. It is the only strip club we know that's casual and anarchic enough a dancer might answer a text on her phone from the stage. There are burgers if you need to stabilize your blood sugar, but that's all that should be expected of them. Imagine a non-art-directed version of the Sons of Anarchy clubhouse: No patch required.

ENTERTAINMENT: Pool, video poker, nude dancing, occasional nude conversation.

2460 NW 24th Ave., 503-227-5384, nicolaistreet.com. 10 am-2:30 am Monday-Friday, 1 pm-2:30 am Saturday, 1 pm-1 am Sunday.

Willamette Week

Zach Middleton

Culture Writer Zach Middleton writes about food and drinks, books, movies, and oddities. Originally from Central Oregon, he now writes out of the University Park neighborhood in North Portland.

Willamette Week’s reporting has concrete impacts that change laws, force action from civic leaders, and drive compromised politicians from public office.

Help us dig deeper.