RuPaul's Drag Race star to appear at Doncaster's newest LGBTQIA+ bar

The Library, which is under development in St George’s Gate, is booking up stars of the UK drag scene to perform when it opens and has now announced that one of the first to appear will be Birmingham born Asian performer Sum Ting Wong.

The Chinese drag star appeared on the first season of the hugely popular show which sees drag queens go head to head to be named the UK’s number one.

The name originates from a terrible case of fake news where San Francisco television station KTVU fell victim to a prank while reporting on the crash of Asiana Airlines Flight 214 in 2013.

“When I started doing drag five years ago, I wanted a name that was cheeky but also reflected my British Vietnamese heritage, so I browsed the internet and came across a meme about an American news report which turned out to be a prank,” Wong recalls.

“It was about a missing Asian plane and all the names of the missing crew were plays on Chinese names, such as Sum Ting Wong and ‘Wi Tu Lo’, and another was ‘Ho Lee Fuk’. It was wrong in so many ways, and that was why I chose my name, as my own act of reclamation!

The bar has also announced its first resident drag family – Zehaus – and boss Sam Teale Price has announced that further Drag Race stars will come to town when The Library opens.

LGBTQIA+ stands for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, pansexual, genderqueer, queer, intersexed, agender, asexual and ally community or people questioning their sexual identity – but the bar will be open to all.

Sam, who also runs the nearby Olde Castle pub with husband Craig, said: “We want Doncaster’s LGBTQIA+ community to have somewhere they can call their own. This will be an all-inclusive safe space for everyone to enjoy and have a good time.”

The split level bar will feature a downstairs dancefloor area ‘with a club vibe’ according to Sam, while the upstairs area will have a quieter theme to live up to its name, decked out with olde worlde books and vintage sofas and decor.