Les 3W Café
8 rue des Ecouffes

New Yorkers will likely find the décor - rainbow flags covering the ceiling, a glass plaque featuring two white doves nuzzling, frosted windows - a little cheesy here in this central lesbian haunt, but this big, popular, two-story lesbian bar is open for drinks and dancing most nights, making it a staple. We arrived at 1 am, just an hour before closing time, which might account for our rough treatment at the hands of an over-styled, slightly put-out bartender (the kir she gave me was drowning in Cassis, and I'm convinced she served me a petite amie rough, bottom-shelf whiskey at a top-shelf price). Looking around, though, there was much to appreciate. On the night we visited, two gorgeous, possibly Eritrean girls chatted radiantly at one end of the bar. Between rounds, a large, mixed group of French and Australian girls came tumbling in, the Aussies dressed to the nines in party costumes, a gorgeous lily pinning back the hair of one, white patent leather pumps on the other, and their French dates stunningly butch in the old school, 50s boy haircut, suspender-wearing way - James Dean meets Leslie Feinberg meets Paris. I've read that 3W stands for "Women With Women" and an older Parisian friend tells me the club used to be called Les Scandaleuses, a fitting history considering the mix of slapdash, suburban functionality and pleasant scandal we encountered here.

Le Nyx
30 rue du Roi de Sicile

Right around the corner from 3W, Le Nyx had a joyful, local atmosphere the night we visited. The space itself is quite standard - two beers on tap, small square tables - but the clowning of the male bartender, dressed in a tight, pink "Nyx" T-shirt and a fabulously blue, beaded necklace, and impish lesbian owner made an ordinary Wednesday night feel like a celebration. A dildo fixed to the wall above the bar and a vase filled with free Jackets and lube, each with the English phrase "Just use it!" printed across the front, inspired a long and fruitful conversation about sex, and everyone began smiling when a techno remix of "I Am What I Am" flooded the bar. On our way out the charming, excitable owner, by this point smoking on the stoop, called out "Goodnight babies!"