Nothing makes you feel more terminally thirtysomething than taking a disco nap before heading to a nightclub, preoccupied with the mental math of how many Fernet shots you can down without guaranteeing yourself an earth-shattering hangover the next morning. But for a visit to Podlasie Club, Avondale’s destination discotheque, it was worth the sacrifice, even if it reminded me of my age in clubbing years.
I won’t claim to reign as a supreme expert on Chicago’s nightlife, but I’ve spent my fair share of hours molting my worries away at Smartbar’s front left speaker and crying into my cardigan at Danny’s Smiths Night (R.I.P.). At the very least, I’m still dialed enough into the pulse to know that Podlasie (pronounced “pohd-LA-shyeh”)—once a bustling dive catering to the Polish working class back in the ’80s and ’90s—has become one of the Chicago’s buzziest nightclubs and the cornerstone of Avondale nightlife.
Every Thursday through Saturday (and some weekdays), a line of eager, maddeningly stylish dancers snakes down Central Park Avenue, sometimes winging around the corner in a halo around Central Park Bar. Skittish twentysomethings suck on their vapes while dance floor veterans sort their cash and fish earplugs from their pockets as the line inches closer toward Podlasie’s retro red-and-white marquee, complete with glittering incandescent bulbs. Podlasie has developed a following not so much around genre—the programming zigs and zags around musical conventions, from Italo disco and reggaeton to ambient and drum ’n’ bass—but more so around the community and good will the club has built throughout its nearly 40-year tenure in the neighborhood.
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Violetta Konopka and Danuta Pluta opened Podlasie’s doors in 1986 after emigrating from Poland, and the bar quickly became a destination for fellow Poles to catch polka bands or get strong drinks on the cheap. As gentrification creeped in and the Polish community moved out, Podlasie’s programming went dormant and business slowed to a near-halt, leaving it teetering on the brink of closure. In July 2021, though, everything would change—quite literally—overnight. A local contingent of creative workers and curators threw a one-off, shot-in-the-dark party called Podlasie Pleasure Club, which drew over a hundred people and left the bar booming until last call for the first time in decades. Since that glorious comeback, a team of bookers has ferried the bar into a new era that revolves around its dance floor.
Walking into Podlasie, it’s easy to recognize its dive bar roots, even after a 2021 renovation stripped the bar of its Polish beer signs and retro stone walls. Murals of topless mermaids and faux bird of paradise plants bookend the dimly-lit bar, and leather booths are flanked by bubbled chrome privacy screens—think David Lynch’s Black Lodge seen through the eyes of an ’80s club kid. Walk through a gauzy black curtain and you’ll find yourself swimming through a haze of fog and neon toward a monolith of a DJ booth. Hovering over the modest dance floor is a trellis of LED bars that undulate in time with the beat. In an age when most urban buildings are morphing into grey boxes designed for commercial real estate handoffs, a place like Podlasie—with true grit and an unapologetic sense of place—is a gift. Not to mention the sound system, which was upgraded during the 2021 renovation: The room’s audio is beautifully crisp—no muddied bass or tinny blowouts.
I visited Podlasie to catch a showcase curated by I-94, a sonic exchange between Chicago and Detroit that honors each city’s house and techno roots. The crowd was sparse around 10pm, with a few cliques bobbing to the beat and one loner trance dancing along the dance floor's perimeter. By the time the night’s headliner K-Alexi Shelby, a Chicago house juggernaut, took to the decks, the floor was swarming with folks two-stepping, snapping selfies and clinking drinks.
As the set wore on, I could feel my initial qualms about coming out of dance floor retirement fade beneath the glow of the light show and the liquid courage won from a couple High Lifes. I wasn’t worried about my age or the hangover—only about how soon I could return.