New dance club in downtown Akron at Studio Exchange

A new dance club, Studio Exchange, is opening at 1 W. Exchange St. on Nov. 26.
The club features a light-up disco dance floor and will host live entertainment, including drag shows and bands.
While it is a gay bar, the owners emphasize it is a safe and inclusive space for everyone.
The grand opening weekend will feature performers from “RuPaul’s Drag Race” and a Fleetwood Mac cover band.

It’s been Peter Sovacool-Goff’s dream for decades to open his own dance club. Now, it’s happening Nov. 26 with the splashy opening of Studio Exchange at 1 W. Exchange St. in downtown Akron, complete with entertainment throughout the holiday weekend.

Studio Exchange, whose name got its inspiration from Studio 54 in New York City, will kick off on Thanksgiving Eve with a soft opening drag show Nov. 26, featuring performers Shari Turner, Samantha Styles, Danyel Vasquez, Marley Muvarri and Daphne Dupree, hosted by Alejandra J. Love.

The doors will open at 6 p.m., with the entertainment starting at midnight. A cover charge of $5 will apply late evening.

Both live entertainment and a new, disco dance floor that lights up make this new club distinctive, said Sovacool-Goff, who is opening Studio Exchange with business entrepreneur Earl Winner, his longtime friend.

“The last dance bar downtown had was Lux and Purgatory. It’s been a long time,” Sovacool-Goff said of dance clubs that formerly operated on the second floor of his building as well as next door. “It’s been a long time since this kind of experience has been downtown and I’m just ready to turn it out.”

The club’s new 16-by-14-foot dance floor, which was delivered Nov. 18 from Miami, dominates the center space under a rose-gold disco ball at Studio Exchange.

It’s surrounded by booths, soft seating and high-top tables that light up and have champagne buckets next to them. The color scheme for the bar is red, black and white, including new chairs with red seats.

DJs will control the lighting sequences in the acrylic dance floor, which guests are expected to surround for a standing-room experience.

Studio Exchange is located in the space formerly occupied by DeJuan’s restaurant and, before that, Bricco. Now, the establishment has big red “X” decals on the windows proclaiming the name Studio Exchange.

Weekend of entertainment

The entertainment will keep coming throughout grand opening weekend, with Kennedy Davenport from “RuPaul’s Drag Race” performing at midnight Nov. 28 and Plane Jane from the same show performing at midnight Nov. 29. Finally, on Nov. 30, Silver Springs, a Fleetwood Mac cover band, will perform at 8 p.m.

Before all the entertainment fun starts, Studio Exchange will have a ribbon-cutting ceremony with city officials at 3 p.m. Nov. 25.

The club, which is a gay bar, is open to all. Sovacool-Goff stressed that security, which will be present on Fridays and Saturdays, is a high priority for Studio Exchange.

“My No. 1 priority is to have a safe place for everyone to go and have a good time with a proper amount of security and lit-up areas, and just be able to feel free to be who you are and dance the night away and have drinks and food,” he said.

Regular hours will be 3 p.m. to 2:30 a.m. daily. Valet parking will be provided for $7. Happy hour will be 3 to 9 p.m.

Studio Exchange is expected to launch its kitchen, Phrase Grill run by Frey Canty, Dec. 2. The menu will include starters such as salmon bites, wings and eggrolls; handheld sandwiches; flatbreads; salads; pastas and entrees including New York strip steak, lobster tails and more.

Other entertainment that Sovacool-Goff will be booking will be dancers, reality TV stars, live bands, comedians and singers. Acts will perform Thursday through Saturday each week, as well as some Sundays.

Sovacool-Goff, who worked at the Interbelt Nite Club in Akron for 23 years, was the entertainment director there for 19 years. The Akron resident left the Interbelt in November 2024, to pursue his own business.

Winner, who lives in Youngstown, has worked in the bar industry for many years, also. He owns T&J’s Brickhouse in the Youngstown area as well as the real estate investment company Winmor Holdings.

Winner described the upscale Studio Exchange as an ultra club, which is in between a tavern and a nightclub. The club’s back room has two pool tables and large posters of famous drag queens.

“I’m very excited. I’m overwhelmed but excited” for the opening, he said.

On Nov. 19, the club’s light-up dance floor, which moves in and out of various colors on multiple settings, was half installed.

“My hope is that you drive by and see the lights through the windows and want to know what the hell’s going on inside and come inside and have a good time,” Sovacool-Goff said.