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But there's so much variety in terms of shape, size, age, ethnicity. "At a lot of the clubs downtown, there's a very stereotypical view of what a stripper looks like. Carlson discovered a tight-knit – and diverse – group of employees. But beyond the bunker-like basement change rooms and crumbling bricks, Ms. I think people went a little overboard online," she said, though she conceded that decades of the Queen and Dundas streetcars rumbling extremely close to the aging building has caused the structure to decay. Carlson moved to the city's east end in December and needed a new venue the bar where she used to perform was an hour away in Etobicoke. Online reviews and locals bill it as the bar where Toronto's strippers "go to retire." A row of industrial steel shafts prop up the ceiling across from the mirrored stage, where dancers wipe down the poles with paper towels between sets. Inside, the dust on the eighties, geometric-patterned carpet glitters under the blacklight. The club and building's owners neglected it for decades. Over the years, Jilly's – though never quite glamorous – became increasingly gritty. Now QeDesh has been retired into the institutional memory of the club as a symbol of wilder days past. I just can't even picture that happening."Īccording to newspaper reports from the time, the declawed, 203-kilogram Siberian tiger named QeDesh was part of dancer Jane Jones's "Exotic Circus" act that appeared at Jilly's in December, 1991, and caused an uproar with local animal activists. "This animal was crawling all around and everyone was going crazy because they were so scared. A co-worker told her the tale shortly after she started dancing at the bar. "There was a performer that came in and they brought a live tiger with them," says Ellie Carlson, a 21-year-old University of Toronto master's candidate and a dancer who has worked at Jilly's since January. There's the rumour that Jilly was the original owner's daughter. The bar is home to more than three decades of memories for those who flogged drinks and danced in patrons' laps. They're eager to see the building restored to its former glory, but they say they'll miss Jilly's. Small shops are slowly being replaced with chains and condo buildings, the average housing price has jumped to more than $500,000 and the gritty charm of one of the city's last characteristically urban intersections is fading away.ĭancers and employees of Jilly's past and present find the whole experience bittersweet. And the city's east end continues to gentrify all around Jilly's – behind the club is an off-leash dog park and a strip of new town homes lies a few blocks north – making it seem even more out of place. Faced with increased competition from body-rub parlours and barriers from city bylaws that prevent the opening of new clubs, stripping is on the decline in Toronto. The closing marks the end of the era, both for the neighbourhood and for stripping. After 34 years of attracting the attention of passersby, Jilly's will be closed for good Sunday night. The Queen East strip club is an infamous institution with its burnt-out neon sign, cheesy faded posters of eighties glamour models and hot pink window covers promising "Girls! Girls! Girls!" The bar is housed on the ground floor of the Broadview Hotel: a towering, red, Romanesque revival beauty that has stood at the corner of Broadview and Queen since 1893 and recently captured the imagination of Streetcar Developments, which purchased the building in May. Any Torontonian who has ever trundled along the 501 streetcar east of the Don Valley Parkway or stumbled down the block after a concert at the Opera House knows Jilly's.