LGBTQ+ Mykonos

Pierro's was opened by the Italian-American painter Pierro Aversa and the fisherman Andreas Koutsoukos, and it was the island's first LGBTQ+ friendly bar. It began as a cocktail bar and soon added drag shows, with the drag duo Jack and Karlos, to become the centre of gay Mykonos. It was the decade in which the island went from a quiet fishing village to a destination of the international jet set, and its reputation as a free place was built then. Today the scene rests on the bars of Chora, with Jackie O' in town and Jackie O' Seaside at Super Paradise, and on Elia, the island's longest sandy beach, whose eastern end is the gay beach of Mykonos.

The big date of the year is XLSIOR, launched in 2009 and grown into one of Europe's leading gay dance festivals: every August it brings more than 30,000 visitors to the island, with international DJs and major names of the circuit scene. That is why this page speaks of a scene rather than a march: Mykonos celebrates the island's way, and its rhythm is the rhythm of summer. Out of season the island genuinely empties - most bars and clubs close until spring - so the list fills from May to October and peaks in August.