The Tool Box, a downtown El Paso gay bar that has served the city’s LGBTQ community for more than 20 years, has quietly doubled its footprint with a second location on the East Side. The new bar, Tool Box East, sits in the Sunfire Village shopping center at 2106 N. Zaragoza Road and is designed to give regulars who live farther out a safer, more welcoming night out without the long trek downtown.
New East Side Outpost at Sunfire Village
Tool Box East occupies units 101-103 inside Sunfire Village’s Zaragoza Road retail strip, according to the property’s leasing listing. The Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation shows a tenant-improvement project registered for “Tool Box East” at 2106 N. Zaragoza, Suite 101. As reported by the El Paso Times, the owners announced on Facebook that Tool Box East will operate from 4 p.m. to 2 a.m. Tuesday through Saturday.
A Downtown Fixture Heads East
The original Tool Box has anchored downtown nightlife at 506 N. Stanton Street since the mid-2000s and has long been a hub for El Paso’s LGBTQ scene. The Downtown El Paso district directory lists the Stanton Street location and shows regular evening hours. With the new East Side address, the bar now gives patrons two options on opposite ends of the city.
Owners Say They Wanted To Be Closer
Owners told reporters they opened Tool Box East “to give the community a safe and welcoming place to enjoy a night out while being a little closer to home.” As the El Paso Times notes, customers from East El Paso and Horizon had raised concerns about travel time and rising ride-share fares, which helped push the decision. The owners framed the new location as a direct response to those complaints.
Part Of A Wider Eastside Nightlife Push
Tool Box East arrives as operators increasingly test East El Paso for nightlife, with new dance clubs and late-night concepts targeting the Gateway and Zaragoza corridors this summer. Hoodline coverage of the planned Las Tóxicas debut and local TV reports on similar spots along Gateway Blvd show a broader push to capture the late-night crowd. Regulators and permitting will ultimately decide what kind of after-hours programming each venue can host.
State project records list tenant and contractor details for the Sunfire Village buildout, and River Oaks Properties' leasing page now shows those units marked for the new bar. More event and opening details are expected to roll out on the bar’s social media as the East Side schedule takes shape, while city permitting remains the public trail to track the project’s progress.
