“Oh my god, he was so amazing,” said one person who knew Alex Calderwood. “And so humble.”
“He was this force of nature in the nightlife scene,” said another. “He had this way of magnetizing people together.”
“He was fearless,” said a third person. “He was doing things that were ahead of their time.”
Before the nightclub ARO.space, before Ace Hotel, before Rudy’s Barbershop, Calderwood worked at a clothing store on Broadway that salvaged old work wear and resold it as vintage fashion. That’s what he was doing when he met Linda Derschang, five years before she would open Linda’s Tavern. “Alex was a part of Seattle nightlife since the late ’80s,” Derschang said. “I believe he had an after-hours club then in the International District, from 2 to 5 in the morning”—where they served drinks long after last call.
