It was a delicious debate on what was the best film ever made about filmmaking. I maintained that it was Franí§ois Truffaut’s Day for Night, while she thought it was Robert Altman’s The Player.

Unfortunately, it was 3 a.m. and the bar was closing. But hey, no worries—we just went to the pub next door, which was open 24 hours.

Welcome to Brighton, Britain’s home of hedonism.

Brighton is a nonstop party town—and the party started in the late 1700s. It was then that the son of a mad monarch created the world’s first holiday resort, which today is the happiest place in Britain.

The city (officially Brighton and Hove, population 248,000) sits right on the English Channel, in the county of East Sussex, about 100 kilometres directly south of London.

On June 4, BBC News reported the results of a nationwide survey designed to determine where the happiest people in the U.K. lived. The winner was Brighton, with 94 percent of Brightonians saying they were happy with their lives. If you’re interested, the unhappiest people live in Belfast.

Not only is Brighton the happiest, it’s also the gayest and the greenest city in the country. Why? Paul Elgood should know. He’s gay, he’s green, and he’s happy. He’s also a city councillor.

“I think it’s all down to tolerance, diversity, and our history of gaiety,” he says. Elgood puts the city’s gay population at around 26 percent; in comparison, it’s about 20 percent in San Francisco.

Brighton’s history of decadence began with the Prince Regent (later King George IV), who was a dandy, a lothario, a party animal, and a total hypochondriac. When his doctor told him that bathing in seawater would cure all his ills, the Prince made a beeline for Brighton. He ordered the famous architect John Nash to create a royal palace where he could entertain his court, his mistresses, and his many rich, noble cronies. Today it’s known as the Royal Pavilion, and it’s simply the greatest folly ever constructed on British soil—an architectural practical joke. It looks like a cross between a maharajah’s palace, a Chinese temple, and a really bad acid trip. It’s now a museum and art gallery, and, like many public buildings in Britain, it seems to frequently suffer from the dreaded scaffolding disease. 

The city’s other iconic structure is its pier, which, like every other pier along the coast, is basically a waste of time. It’s essentially a glorified video arcade.

The epicentre of gaydom in Brighton is a neighbourhood called Kemptown. Its main drag, St. James’s Street, makes Davie Street look positively Presbyterian. This is where you’ll find the pubs and clubs that pump and pulsate for days on end without ever closing. The most famous is the Bulldog, which stays open from Friday morning to Monday or Tuesday afternoon.

Kemptown is home to hundreds of actors, all part of Brighton’s rich theatrical heritage. The Theatre Royal here celebrated its 200th anniversary this year. Sir Laurence Olivier once lived in Kemptown; his seafront mansion was recently advertised for rent at the equivalent of $20,000 a month. The area also boasts Britain’s first nudist beach officially sanctioned by a city.

The personality of a city is often influenced by the attitude of its municipal leaders, and Brighton’s council is enlightened to the point of eccentricity.

Every bus in the town has a name, taken from the famous people who once lived here. You can hop on King Charles II, transfer to Dusty Springfield, and finish your journey on Ida Lupino. Last week I rode Winston Churchill. These buses also run on time, 24 hours a day, and they’re clean, safe, and cheap. Obviously, having such a brilliant public-transit system takes thousands of cars off the roads.

Western Road is to Brighton what Kitsilano’s West 4th is to Vancouver—a former hippie haven now transformed into an í¼ber-cool shopping and dining destination. It’s home to Brighton’s best straight-friendly pubs: the Robin Hood and the Duke of Norfolk.

The Robin Hood is appropriately named, since it’s Britain’s first and only charity pub. After its operating costs are covered, every penny of profit from the bar goes to local charities and not-for-profit organizations, such as small independent theatre companies.

The Duke of Norfolk is everything you’d hope for in a traditional English pub. It has real ales, great food, eccentric regulars, and lovely old dogs sleeping under tables. (Dogs and children are allowed in pubs in Brighton. I once saw a gorgeous golden retriever sitting on a barstool lapping up a pint of Guinness.)

The pub’s assistant manager, A. J. Jackson, is typical of many young people here in that he’s not from Brighton. He has more tattoos than the British navy and more piercings than St. Sebastian.

“I’m from a small town in the north of England,” he says. “If I looked and acted like I do up there, they’d kill me. Brighton rocks because you can be anyone you want here; nobody gives a shit.”

This, of course, attracts a diverse range of people and creates a thriving arts and culture scene. Brighton is blessed with more than its fair share of gifted writers, abstract painters, out-of-work actors, and aging prostitutes.

When the Prince Regent set up his pleasure palace here, he was followed by a host of rich aristocrats, who in turn built stunning Georgian squares, terraces, and crescents along the seafront. It’s impossible to behold this magnificent architecture without feeling a frisson of pure awe. These buildings, collectively, look like an exhibition of six-storey wedding cakes.

Ultimately, if you could lay a city on a psychiatrist’s couch and ask it questions, what would you ask Brighton?

Why are you so happy? Why are you so gay? Why are you so green?

Surely, the obvious answer would be”¦come and find out. -

Access: From London’s Victoria Station, trains leave for Brighton about every 20 minutes. The trip takes 49 minutes and costs $20 for a day return. Useful sites include www.visitbrighton.com/, www.royalpavilion.org.uk/, and www.bulldogbrighton.com/.