The Drake’s dining room was transformed into summer-school kitsch in the space of one weekend. (Image: Gizelle Lau)

The Drake Hotel has never been afraid of a little shtick, and pop-up and quasi pop-up operations have long been a part of that. There’s the Drake General Store (and its two sister locations across the city), the now-defunct Scoops and Tees and its successor the Drake BBQ, a pop-up shop that, in true pop-up fashion, will serve its last pulled pork sandwiches and whoopie pies this Saturday. This summer, the Drake is launching the Dining Roadshow, a sort of in situ pop-up program that GM Bill Simpson told us is “meant to be an exploration over the next year as we plan to expand The Drake.” The roadshow will feature a series of thematically changing restaurant concepts that will be highly theatrical, whimsical and, yes, pretty darn kitschy. The first stop: Summer School Dining Hall.

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