Why Guy Fieri Is Helping An Ohio Library Become Flavortown HQ

What is Flavortown? Is it some fabled wonderland where food never goes bad and leftovers always taste just the same as when you bought them? Do the rivers flow with buffalo sauce along a shore of bleu cheese and the crispiest, juiciest wings flow beneath the fiery orange surface? It is where cherry-red Camaros frolic in fields of soft pretzel sticks? Or maybe it's just some wacky nickname Guy Fieri thought up? Whichever you prefer.

Guy Fieri's trips to the promised Flavortown are frequently documented on his show "Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives."  But despite him saying it enough that it could pretty much be his go-to catchphrase, we really don't know all that much about where this place is. It has its own website, but even that lacks any clear directions on how to get there. Guy did mention a few laws in Flavortown back in 2019 (via Food Network), describing a town where bacon is encouraged on every dish, sauce is to be used with authority, and lighter fluid is forbidden. While a law mandating that men must don frosted tips and khaki shorts isn't mentioned, we'll take an educated guess and say it exists. 

To summarize, Flavortown has a website, laws, and of course, Mayor Fieri. Yet we still don't know how to get there. Is there one, true Flavortown to begin with? Perhaps we should start our search at Flavortown HQ which, surprisingly enough, is actually a library out in Columbus, Ohio.

While you may imagine Flavortown HQ to be marked with a statue of Guy Fieri leading children to Flavortown the same way the statue of Walt Disney is leading Mickey Mouse by the hand, Flavortown HQ is actually the supposed nickname of the Columbus Library in Ohio. According to a post made on the library's social media account, if every single person in Columbus was able to get a library card in September, they would change the name of the library to Flavortown HQ — something that Guy Fieri was eager to support.

Oddly enough, Columbus actually has a few connections with Guy Fieri and the world of diners and drive-ins. Fieri was born there in 1968 before moving out to California (via Biography), technically making him an honorary resident and perhaps sparking the idea for Flavortown HQ. Wendy's also opened its doors in Columbus in 1969, with the city being home to the World's First Wendy's building until it closed in 2007 (via Roadside America).

Although it is still debatable whether the library will actually change its name, we still don't know where Flavortown actually is. PopSugar likens it somewhat to The Matrix: a place that's all in your head that exists only if you believe in it. As for us at Mashed, we like to think Flavortown is the heart and soul of every roadside diner and off-beat restaurant that dots the highways and towns of America.