We checked out of the Gladstone, Husband headed to the financial district, and I strolled down Queen Street to the Drake Hotel. I didn’t want to leave the area without getting, at the very least, a cursory look at the Gladstone’s kissing cousin.
The building began its life in 1890 as Small’s Hotel, catering to the tourist trade brought in by the Canadian Pacific Railroad. In 1949 it acquired new owners and received its current moniker. The Drake mirrored Parkdale’s economic decline, ending up as a low-rent rooming house, serving some of the neighbourhood’s most at risk citizens. In 2001 it was purchased by businessman Jeff Stober and refurbished into a local cultural hot spot and boutique-style hotel. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drake_Hotel_(Toronto)
I asked permission of the front desk staff and proceeded to peek and shoot my way around the main floor lounge and dining room. The mid-morning light streams in the front windows, and the rooms are quiet, like rich still-lifes, full of murals, portraits, multi-media art, books and bespoke furniture. This serenity will quickly dissipate as the hours move on, spilling over with a constant stream of diners, bar patrons and eclectic flaneurs, eventually returning to quiet in the very early hours of the following day. The dining room is kitted out in a Chinese theme, the current manifestation of a quarterly thematic rotation, the menu taking its cues from a night out in Chinatown. It behaves like a pop-up eatery, constantly changing and providing a new experience to diners returning to the same space. A back staircase draped with tactile pieces, including a bust by hyper-realist sculptor Ron Mueck, leads to the Sky Yard, a roof-top outdoor space. In the summer, it is a beer garden with an elevated movie screen. In the winter, there are translucent walls, hot chocolate and a roaring fire.
The hotel’s layout is not immediately evident. I pop back out to the lobby with a confused look and am offered a personal tour by the gracious Jonathan LeClaire, hotel manager, who explains that the layout is clear once you’ve walked the entire building. Temporary confusion is not a bad thing, I think. The gradual reveal heightens the sense of excitement.
We descend to a private dining/meeting room (Room 222) and the Underground, a flexible dance/music/meeting space used for regular cultural programming, such as Elvis Mondays, and private parties. We ascend to two of the three room floors along the dramatically low-lit corridors, which add mystery to the narrative. Currently, there are nineteen rooms, with plans to expand into adjacent space that will up that number to forty-five. There are installation art pieces which are only visible from certain views and vantage points, and each floor offers a tableaux , personally chosen by the Drake’s in-house curator Mia Nielsen. The rooms range in size and are referred to as Crash Pads, Dens, Salons and Suites, priced from $189. The optimal use of compact space is exceptional and the sleek design is more SoHo than boho. I snap a photo of the amazing translucent (and sexy) VC, shower and basin combination with a mind to replicate the design at home.
It strikes me, as I write this, that the hotel’s intimate size and tight-knit flavour of the neighbourhood scene doesn’t lend itself naturally to the discreet nature of private dramas within its four walls. The personal nature of the hotel is entirely dependent on the professional discretion of staff and not on the latent anonymity that much larger establishments enjoy. That and the non-linear floor plan, which is, perhaps, the point.
We descend the nickle-plated main staircase into the lobby, all original and completely restored, and pop our heads into the Cafe, which is hopping at this time of day. I trail Jonathan over to the Drake General Store, quizzing him on the environmentally-friendly attributes of the Drake, before we part.
Since I’m planning on being in Toronto on a more regular basis, I look forward to spending some real time at the Drake when it’s less a cabinet of curiosities and more, well, filled with curious people. An eye patch perhaps? Vintage knitwear? All black? I need to start lining up my hipster accoutrements tout de suite.
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