ABSTRACT
This chapter begins the discussion of place as active in the constitution of ordinary lives, by exploring the power of imagining Brighton as the 'gay capital of the UK', as occurred in the first decade of the twenty-first century. In dealing with the failings of the city supposedly 'paved with gay gold', we paradoxically show the productive effects of such failings. This research to an extent showed that this requirement did not deter LGBT people from running to the gay city. The place imaginings of Brighton as 'paved with gay gold' contradicted with the materialities offered by the city to LGBT people who migrate without 'housing solutions', especially where accommodation is expensive and housing support is based on local connections that do not account for LGBT imaginaries of 'home'. The chapter focuses on the effects of dissonance between a city paved with gay gold and the multiple and painful realities for those who did not become ordinary in Brighton.
