Welcome to Greenville Avenue

When you ask someone to meet you on Greenville Avenue, you’d better be ready to explain. On a street with so many different faces, you and your friend may have different Greenvilles in mind. Depending on your perspective, Greenville may mean:

●street festivals like those on St. Patrick’s Day and Mayfest

●the preppy enclaves where future ParkCities matrons gossip and giggle

●hordes of rabid sports fans glued tobig-screen TV’s, pounding the tablesin triumph until their very beers arethreatened

●quiet wine bars where young lawyersrehash their victories and WyndhamHill music repeats like clockwork onthe hour

●seedy, unregenerate dives that thumbtheir noses at gentrification, whereStetsons and Hank Williams Jr. are theorder of the day

●quaint shops where antique buffs andartisans hope to translate inspirationinto cash.

Yes, Greenville Avenue sends mixed signals. For some observers, it’s a lemming trail of shallow materialists seeking one-night stands. For the kid from the suburbs it may be a route of passage, an initiation into the “real” (or unreal) world. For some, it’s a place to shake off the worries of work and dance the night away; for others, it may bring on the dark night of the soul, when they wonder if they have measured out too much of their lives in bar tabs.

Greenville almost defies categorization. The street is home to TGI Friday’s, but also the Granada Theatre; South-fork, but also Stan’s Blue Note; Blue-bonnet Health Foods and Fletcher’s Corny Dogs; Bowley and Wilson’s and the Unity Church; Poor David’s Pub and the Acapulco Bar. If variety is the spice of life, Greenville is the spiciest street Dallas has to offer.

In a sense, Greenville Avenue cuts through Dallas’ past and into her future. The street begins in the modest frame houses and apartments of Lowest Greenville, near the big Sears store with its polyester chic. It runs through the “M” streets (McCommas, Matilda, McMillan, etc.), which comprise one of the last viable neighborhoods in old Dallas. Once across Mockingbird-the Great Divide-Greenville trades its faded jeans and T-shirts for the glittery togs suitable for places such as Café Dallas, which is now settling into middle age, and Acapulco, the Cafe Dallas of spring 1985. The intersection of Greenville and Lovers Lane, near the sprawling singles haven of The Village, is ground zero for the explosion into Dallas’ future-for better or worse.

Whatever it is-the street of dreams for some, lonely street for others- Greenville Avenue glows with its own magic. Here’s a look at Dallas’ premier party street.