Like Portland’s ridiculously high volume of strip clubs, our adult entertainment industry is second to none. You’ll find more porn stores in Portland and its surrounding area than you ever thought possible.
I know what you’re thinking: How can I ever navigate this lovely mess? Say hello to Nick’s porn store roundup.
For the fetishist
Spartacus (300 SW 12th Ave.)
Believe it or not, Spartacus is pretty big outside of Portland. They are manufacturers of fine leather sex goods, and the spot downtown is their flagship.
Most people think it’s just a sex shop, but Spartacus actually has a factory shop of sorts in the Southeast Industrial District, too. They export harnesses, riding crops and other accoutrements for sale all over the world in high-end shops. An online catalog is yours to browse if you don’t want to be caught looking at ball gags next to someone you might know.
Spartacus has a fine selection of stuff that you wouldn’t think existed; things like rubber sheets, specially designed pieces of furniture and various surgical tools like speculums and pinwheels. They keep it classy, though. The place is stylish and un-intimidating (except for all those leather masks).
Female friendly
She Bop (909 N Beech St.)
Yes, that’s right, a sex-toy shop named after a Cyndi Lauper song. Of course, the song alludes to female masturbation, so the name is fitting. She Bop is Portland’s only female-oriented sex shop.
Even if you’ve traipsed up and down North Mississippi Street, you may have missed this one. It’s on Beech, a side-street with little else. The space is very cute and airy, and you don’t feel like you need a deionizing rinse afterward.
They carry an ultra-premium line of toys, so the selection is never poor despite the small storefront. The clerks are all extremely knowledgeable and willing to help a fellow enthusiast and the average curiosity-seeker.
Plus, they carry Crown condoms. So men: Do yourself a favor and pick some up, because they’re the best—and seemingly tough to come by.
Kohl’s for dildos
Castle Megastore (9815 SW Capitol Hwy.)
If you’ve recently fallen into a large sum of money and are hankering to grab a cart and load it to the brim with sex toys, Castle Megastore is your best bet. That isn’t to say the toys are prohibitively expensive (actually, due to the large number of adult stores in Portland, the prices are very competitive), but the place is called the “Megastore” for a reason.
It is ridiculous, the selection inside Castle. Within this oddly positioned building just off Capital Highway, you’ll find an almost Target-sized array of sex toys. Anything you’ve ever heard of or seen on the Internet is right here, and the place is staffed by people in uniforms trained to help you make the right selection. An entire wall is dedicated to testing their array. Take advantage of this boon.
Ye olde porn
Fat Cobra Video (5940 N Interstate Ave.)
Adult shops have tried time and again to reinvent themselves as fun, lighthearted places that aren’t custom designed to alienate wholesome people, and there is one place that keeps it far more real than most: Fat Cobra Video.
It’s no secret: Video arcades in adult shops are populated largely by gay and bisexual men. Women rarely venture into the arcade, and when they do, they’re usually accompanied by a male cohort. Fat Cobra knows its clientele very well. In fact, their phone number is 503-247-DICK. That’s no joke and no accident.
It’s not completely uncommon to spot a hipster sporting a Fat Cobra shirt in the wild, and the shirts reflect the intentionality of the phone number—let’s just leave it at that. But before you race there to get one, you should know that they don’t sell them anymore, and they seem to have downplayed the significance of their phone number in recent years.
Regardless, you’re always in for a treat if you look up “Fat Cobra” or “The Cobra” on Craigslist personals. The tales are always as lewd as you would expect with a name like Fat Cobra. Also, the exterior of the place looks like a seedy Greek deli. The people that work there are nice, but the porn store experience your parents once enjoyed is alive and well at Fat Cobra.