Vesterbro, southwest of the city centre, was Copenhagen's roughest working-class neighbourhood for most of the 20th century — a red-light district of cheap hotels and meatpacking plants. It has been gentrified steadily since the 1990s and is now one of the hippest areas in the city, but it still has edges that keep it from becoming sterile.
Istedgade is the main drag: sex shops and immigrant grocery stores alongside coffee roasters and cocktail bars. The Meatpacking District (Kødbyen) has transformed into the best cluster of restaurants and bars in Copenhagen — half the ambitious young chefs in the city have opened here in the old slaughterhouse buildings. Vesterbro is also where you find Vega, the city's best music venue.