# What is the strangest designed restaurant you've ever eaten in? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [April 1, 2005, 11:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-strangest-designed-restaurant-youve-ever-eaten-in/297215 "2005-04-01T11:55:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Shirley\_Ujest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shirley\_Ujest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shirley_Ujest)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 11:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-strangest-designed-restaurant-youve-ever-eaten-in/297215/1 "2005-04-01T11:55:45Z")
I have to say I avoid **TGI Friday’s** because of their junkyard approach decorating. I also cannot tolerate the **Flair** on the servers suspenders. How 1980ish :rolleyes: The irony is that the my inlaws favorite restaurant has been for years **Beef Carver** which sounds like some kind porno film training video.which is decorated in the \*\*1776 theme \*\*that was popular 30 years ago and hasn’t changed one bit. This location was recently bought out, which is a shame, their food was really good and affordable. ---
**Author:** ![fishbicycle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/aeb1de/32.png) [@fishbicycle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fishbicycle)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 12:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-strangest-designed-restaurant-youve-ever-eaten-in/297215/2 "2005-04-01T12:18:16Z")
**Cracker Barrel** seems to have a kind of _farm kitsch and rusty-implements-bolted-to-the-wall_ decor, which is very strange, if you think on it. And the other half of their business is from the gift shop in the front of the place. Strange concept for a restaurant, if you ask me. ---
**Author:** ![pullin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c57346/32.png) [@pullin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pullin)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 12:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-strangest-designed-restaurant-youve-ever-eaten-in/297215/3 "2005-04-01T12:31:44Z")
A restaurant near our house is actually an old train car. Right on the shore of a lake, on exactly one traincar-length of railroad track. No trains, or train-related stuff nearby, just this traincar. Inside it there’s another train (a little one, HO sized, puffing madly around an elevated track over your head). It always strikes me as kinda recursive, going inside a train to eat and watch a train. But the burgers are good. ---
**Author:** ![China\_Guy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/779978/32.png) [@China\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/China_Guy)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 12:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-strangest-designed-restaurant-youve-ever-eaten-in/297215/4 "2005-04-01T12:40:43Z")
There are plenty of really wierd themed restaurants in asia. I always like the Dinosaur in Taiwan. You enter through a T-rex open mouth, and the inside was a cavernous 3 story open place with giant fake bones and dinosaur skeletons inside with wait staff in a psuedo western chic getup with cowboy hats and holsters for taking orders. Chinese bar food and cheap beer. That’s about as good as it gets 🆒 ---
**Author:** ![Amp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Amp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amp)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 12:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-strangest-designed-restaurant-youve-ever-eaten-in/297215/5 "2005-04-01T12:43:34Z")
A restaurant I once went to when I was in Arvada, CO. It was decorated in a Canadian theme. It had moose heads, Canadian flags, maple leaf jersey, etc. The wierd thing? It served Mexican food. Nothing but Mexican food but you wouldn’t be able to tell just from the decor. ---
**Author:** ![BiblioCat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ed8c4c/32.png) [@BiblioCat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BiblioCat)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 12:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-strangest-designed-restaurant-youve-ever-eaten-in/297215/6 "2005-04-01T12:44:46Z")
We have a restaurant called Steak and Ale near us (may be part of a chain) that I think is going for “Colonial Pub” as its theme. It’s divided up into lots of little rooms, with maybe 7 or 8 tables in each room, and the place is very dark. Sort of a Tudor look - white plaster with dark crossbeams, very dim lighting, and the windows dividing the rooms have that screening like you’d find in Catholic confessionals. Lots of heavy dark wood and big, high-backed chairs. It’s very weird, though, to go there for lunch and eat in near total darkness. Good food, though. ---
**Author:** ![Athena](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/35a633/32.png) [@Athena](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Athena)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-strangest-designed-restaurant-youve-ever-eaten-in/297215/7 "2005-04-01T13:18:40Z")
We have a locally owned Italian restaurant here where the bar is designed around a gondola. The restaurant’s been around since at least the 1960s. The “Boat Bar” (yes, that’s what they call it) went in when I was a kid, around the mid-70s. The bar is to one side of the restaurant, through a separate entrance. To enter, you walk through black stucco archways to the door, pull it open, and step into a red glow. The room is dominated by the bar, a boat-shaped red and black behemoth. The prow is pointing straight into the karaoke area; the stern disappears back into the kitchen. The room is separated into smaller areas with white stucco archways. Through one set, a pool table is set up - the felt is the same blood red as the carpeting and the bar. Through another set of archways lies a few forlorn tables. Pictures depicting Venician scenes decorate the walls. We go there all the time. ---
**Author:** ![a\_pirahna\_brother](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/4bbf92/32.png) [@a\_pirahna\_brother](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/a_pirahna_brother)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 1:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-strangest-designed-restaurant-youve-ever-eaten-in/297215/8 "2005-04-01T13:41:58Z")
I’ve got 2 candidates: An old **Macado’s** restaurant, you think that TGI Fridays has the junkyard approach to decorating? This place was actually decorated with salvaged items from various demolition jobs, the dividers between booths and different sections were old doors and transoms in various colors and degrees of weathering. There were other items like this as well, large ornate wood carvings, cast iron bits, the whole works. My other candidate is a small bar&grill type restaurant in the same city as our state capital, the food is excellent, best burger I’ve eaten came from there, but the place has obviously remodeled and added on over the years, why? None of the #@$%! floor elevations match up, and the place is slab on grade construction. Once you go through the main entrance, you drop down 18" into some pit type area, then you have to go back up a 12" step to the next area, then if you want to eat near the big screen TV, you climb another 4" step, this area abuts one that is 6" lower. Re: **Cracker Barrel** and the crap on the walls. Did you know that **Cracker Barrel** has a group of people that actively search out and buy all the crap that is on the walls? Each restaurant is decorated according to a plan and pictures that are prepared at HQ, they have a warehouse with walls that are constructed just like the restaurants, the decorators place everything on the walls, then make drawings and take pictures that are sent with the decor items, the decorating team at the new store then places everything according to the drawings and pictures. D.Pirahna ---
**Author:** ![JThunder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e95f7d/32.png) [@JThunder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JThunder)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 1:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-strangest-designed-restaurant-youve-ever-eaten-in/297215/9 "2005-04-01T13:49:33Z")
There’s this restaurant I one ate in which had a bizarre cartoonish motif – talking cheeseburgers, anthropomorphic french fries, and a big purple blob that (I think) was supposed to represent some type of milk shake. Oh, and they had some clownish, redheaded ringleader directing the whole organization. Freakiest thing you ever saw. It looked like it came straight out of a Krofft TV production or something. \<\< Shudder \>\> ---
**Author:** ![BiblioCat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ed8c4c/32.png) [@BiblioCat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BiblioCat)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-strangest-designed-restaurant-youve-ever-eaten-in/297215/10 "2005-04-01T13:55:08Z")
> [@a pirahna brother](#): > > Re: **Cracker Barrel** and the crap on the walls. > Did you know that **Cracker Barrel** has a group of people that actively search out and buy all the crap that is on the walls? > Each restaurant is decorated according to a plan and pictures that are prepared at HQ, they have a warehouse with walls that are constructed just like the restaurants, the decorators place everything on the walls, then make drawings and take pictures that are sent with the decor items, the decorating team at the new store then places everything according to the drawings and pictures. At the Cracker Barrel near us, all the ‘crap on the walls’ has little tags with bar codes. My daughter wondered out loud one time if it was for sale and that maybe the little tags were price tags. I remembered reading somewhere that the crap was arranged just so, and that maybe the tags were coded so the decorators could just zap it and know, “Okay, the rusty pitchfork goes over the window, the wooden spoons go by the door and the faded picture of ole’ Zeke goes over table seven.” ---
**Author:** ![Tamex](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ccd318/32.png) [@Tamex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamex)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 1:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-strangest-designed-restaurant-youve-ever-eaten-in/297215/11 "2005-04-01T13:59:20Z")
I’d have to say that it’s probably [Al’s Breakfast](http://www.tholt.com/als.html). ---
**Author:** ![Eureka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/74df32/32.png) [@Eureka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eureka)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-strangest-designed-restaurant-youve-ever-eaten-in/297215/12 "2005-04-01T14:10:33Z")
Up the Creek was a Southern/Fish/Camp themed restaurant (may be part of a chain, but I’ve not seen any others). It had fishy stuff on the walls and outside. Unfortunately, the restuarant in question- being located in the spot of doom\*- closed within about a year. \*Spot of Doom? It has had 2 or 3 Mexican restaurants, the Up the Creek place, and most recently a barbeque place in the length of time that I’ve known about the place. That’s only about 8 years, and when you consider the length of time that it has generally been vacant between owners, the average restaurant has not been there very long. ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 2:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-strangest-designed-restaurant-youve-ever-eaten-in/297215/13 "2005-04-01T14:14:00Z")
**Clifton’s** in downtown Los Angeles by a mile. Unfortunately it’s no longer there. ---
**Author:** ![williamweigand](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/b3f665/32.png) [@williamweigand](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/williamweigand)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 2:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-strangest-designed-restaurant-youve-ever-eaten-in/297215/14 "2005-04-01T14:15:41Z")
There was a restaurant located either in or near Webster, New York…My memory is sketchy, so I’m not sure if it was all real, or simulated, but you entered the place through the trunk of a large tree and the interior was like being amongst the branches of a tree. Stuffed critters were scattered in the branches. If it’s still there, I’d like to go back. ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 2:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-strangest-designed-restaurant-youve-ever-eaten-in/297215/15 "2005-04-01T14:17:04Z")
[This is Clifton’s](http://www.agilitynut.com/cool2.html) ---
**Author:** ![Harriet\_the\_Spry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e56c9b/32.png) [@Harriet\_the\_Spry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harriet_the_Spry)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 2:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-strangest-designed-restaurant-youve-ever-eaten-in/297215/16 "2005-04-01T14:21:42Z")
Borsodi’s in New Orleans. [http://www.bestofneworleans.com/dispatch/2003-11-11/news\_feat2.html](http://www.bestofneworleans.com/dispatch/2003-11-11/news_feat2.html) ---
**Author:** ![rinni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f6c823/32.png) [@rinni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rinni)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-strangest-designed-restaurant-youve-ever-eaten-in/297215/17 "2005-04-01T14:22:39Z")
Not a strange design, more of a decoration. Frank and Gino’s in Truro, Nova Scotia… Framed Far Side comics all over the walls. Genius! ---
**Author:** ![davmilasav](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e9bcb4/32.png) [@davmilasav](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davmilasav)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-strangest-designed-restaurant-youve-ever-eaten-in/297215/18 "2005-04-01T14:24:29Z")
This is the interior of [Joe’s Crab Shack](http://www.arborfood.com/columns/food-fight/joes-crab-shack.shtml) I’m partial to the one at the Kemah Boardwalk. ---
**Author:** ![FriarTed](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/friarted/32/1052_2.png) [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 2:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-strangest-designed-restaurant-youve-ever-eaten-in/297215/19 "2005-04-01T14:34:29Z")
> [@China Guy](#): > > There are plenty of really wierd themed restaurants in asia. I always like the Dinosaur in Taiwan. You enter through a T-rex open mouth, and the inside was a cavernous 3 story open place with giant fake bones and dinosaur skeletons inside with wait staff in a psuedo western chic getup with cowboy hats and holsters for taking orders. > > Chinese bar food and cheap beer. That’s about as good as it gets 🆒 OMG! That would totally succeed in the US!!! While it’s not all that weird, I’m fond on Frisco’s around L.A. Pseudo-50s decor with booths in fiberglass “cars” and cute waitresses in short skirts & roller skates. ---
**Author:** ![Snowcarpet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowcarpet/32/257_2.png) [@Snowcarpet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowcarpet)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2005, 2:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-strangest-designed-restaurant-youve-ever-eaten-in/297215/20 "2005-04-01T14:41:28Z")
> **[Home | Mike's Place Restaurant in Kent, OH](https://www.mikesplacerestaurant.com/)** > > Lively, irreverent eatery with funky decor & a lengthy menu of American comfort eats. Because eating on a bus is just plain fun. And I like the castle. But I can’t eat a Sumo class sandwich. I can’t really even begin to describe the weirdness of the decor, just look at the pictures! [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-strangest-designed-restaurant-youve-ever-eaten-in/297215.md?page=2)