A few months ago, Kingsway Mall unveiled HyperPOP, an immersive installation space made for taking super cool portraits. “It actually looks like a few different spaces, depending where you’re taking photos from. And every once in a while we do add some things to it,” says Bo Tarasenko, marketing manager at Kingsway Mall.
It opened with Kingsway’s Drag Queen story hour. And since then, people have flocked to the space to take photos in one of the city’s most stylish backdrops. But it’s only ever been open to fur-free creatures with two legs… until this week.
This Friday and Saturday, Kingsway presents HyperPUP Photo Night, a chance for you and your favourite furry friend(s) to get a complimentary professional photo in the eye-popping space. “We’ve been watching people bring their kids out to the HyperPOP space, you know, taking photos in there and finding really fun things to do. And we’ve hosted dog photo ops before, so we just thought, dogs are really a part of their families, just like anyone else. So we wanted to give them a chance to come out, explore this space with their pups, and have a professional photographer take their picture,” Tarasenko says.
The space is an extension of Kingsway’s philosophy of community spirit. “We are so centrally located, in the heart of a bunch of different communities. We’ve always felt that giving as much of Kingsway out as a voice to the community is like… the more the better. So the murals that we’ve put up over the years, the other photo-op spaces we’ve done — it’s all a way to give artists space to create and have the public enjoy it for free.”
So on September 9 and 10 (5-8 p.m.), bring your dog or cat to Kingsway for a photoshoot to show just how pretty and handsome your pets can be — or just show up solo to get pictures of yourself going “aww!” while looking at all the photogenic kitties and pups. The people at Kingsway won’t judge.
