News

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A vacant two-story building in Midtown is undergoing a radical transformation with artfully crafted murals and an award-winning pub and entertainment spot that will serve 130 beers on tap.

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With the announcement of Whole Foods planning to open a store in Chicago's Englewood neighborhood, one of the poorest in the city, the conversation once again turns towards the opening of the Whole Foods in Detroit's Midtown neighborhood last year, including the criticisms it was met with and how, in the span of 14 months, the store had already reached its 10-year sales goal. 

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Meet Mutual Adoration—the power couple behind one of Detroit’s coolest furniture design studios. Wayne and Clare run a design house and experimental craft workshop in their hometown, building furniture from reclaimed materials. With degrees and hands-on experience in seemingly every art and craft, from photography to printmaking to woodworking and lithography, this pair have combined their powers to create truly unique pieces. They currently sell their custom wares regionally—and on Etsy.

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The Kresge Innovative Projects: Detroit is the three-year program that will provide nonprofits between $50,000 and $150,000 for up to 10 projects that can be completed in 18 months. Smaller planning grants will be awarded to organizations with promising ideas, Kresge officials said.

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New Economy Initiative (NEI), a special project of the Community Foundation for Southeast Michigan (CFSEM), announced the 30 small businesses from across Detroit, Hamtramck and Highland Park that were selected to win the $10k challenge for the first-ever NEIdeas: Rewarding Ideas for Business Growth. The 30 winning businesses each received a $10,000 award for a total of $300,000 at a private awards celebration on Oct. 27.

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Emerging and established metropolitan Detroit Literary and Visual artists are invited to apply for a $25,000 Kresge Artist Fellowship. Fellowships are funded by The Kresge Foundation and administered by the Kresge Arts in Detroit office at the College for Creative Studies, with professional practice opportunities for the selected fellows provided by Creative Many Michigan.

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Detroit is still admittedly a tough place. Those who choose to be here grasp life at its deepest level. And the energy Detroit has isn't something you can pinpoint. If you go around looking for it, you won't find it because you can't really see it. The people here are rooted in something spiritual that renders the challenges of the built environment less material.

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Judge Steven Rhodes on Friday approved Detroit's plan to get out of bankruptcy, ending the largest public filing in U.S. history and launching the city into a turnaround that will require discipline after years of corruption, budget-busting debt and an exodus of residents.

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Here Lincoln Now profiles UIX innovator Amy Kaherl in a photo essay based on an interview that originally appeared in Wildsam Field Guides: Detroit.

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Oprah's newfound fascination with Detroit continues in this Super Soul Short, profile UIX innovator Riet Schumack and her husband Mark for their work with Neighbors Building Brightmoor. 

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In this Super Soul Short, we're going green with social activist Riet Schumack and her husband, Mark. They're spearheading a grassroots youth gardening movement to help rebuild Brightmoor, a struggling neighborhood on Detroit's northwest side. Years ago, Brightmoor was ridden with crime and on the brink of abandonment. Today, they're proving that growth and transformation are possible, one garden at a time.

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Detroit has become a place people come to learn about our models of urban entrepreneurship and civic innovation. This is something we should take pride in – but in the same spirit of renewal and the re-thinking and re-shaping that makes Detroit a city to watch, we must continue a broad discussion of what kind of city we want Detroit to be, and how we can achieve that vision.

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Join us for the 5th annual IdeaLab! This year we're kicking-off the Revitalization & Business Conference at the University of Michigan Ross School of Business with a stellar line-up of innovative people & programs from Detroit:

- Katy Locker, Knight Foundation
- Leslie Smith, TechTown
- Patricia Glaza, Invest Detroit
- Jeff Aronoff, D:hive
- Abir Ali, NEIdeas
- Karla Henderson, Ponyride
- Brian R. F. Davis, Bamboo Detroit
- Espy Thomas, Sweet Potato Sensations

If you're curious about the city, and/or suffer from attention-deficit disorder, this is great way to get a lot of information & inspiration in under two hours!

Friday, November 14
10:00am - 12:00pm
U-M Ross School of Business
701 Tappan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109

Want the full R&B conference experience? Stay for lunch, afternoon panels on venture capital and philanthropy, and keynote speaker Aaron Seybert, vice president of JP Morgan Chase. To register for the full-day, click here: http://bit.ly/10SpvbH

IdeaLab is presented by Urban Innovation Exchange and Model D, in partnership with the Michigan Revitalization & Business Club. Thanks to support from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.

- UIX: http://UIXDetroit.com/
- Model D: http://modeldmedia.com/
- R&B: http://revitalizationandbusiness.wordpress.com/

Check out this event on Facebook here.

 

A few weeks ago, I had the good fortune of visiting Detroit for the first Urban Innovation Exchange(UIXDET). Over a three-day period, more than 500 people from across the U.S. came together to share ideas, stories and lessons from the forefront of community transformation. I was delighted to participate in the Art of Place panel to present CoSign, a collaboration between the Haile/U.S. Bank Foundation and the American Sign Museum that unites business owners, artists, designers and sign-makers to create unique storefront signage in neighborhood business districts throughout Greater Cincinnati.

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Light manufacturing is returning in Midtown and downtown is home to start-up incubation and a vibrant technology scene.

Those are two of the reasons CNN Money gives for naming Detroit among 10 of the "most innovative cities in America."

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The Motor City is becoming an unlikely hub for high-end bike manufacturing.

Before there was the Model T, there was the Quadricycle. Henry Ford fashioned his original automobile from four bicycle wheels and a chain at the height of Detroit’s 19th-century bike (yes, bike) manufacturing boom. If Detroit rose and fell on for four wheels, its past—and potentially its future—was built on just two. As the city wends its way through bankruptcy court this fall and its core industry lurches back to solvency, the Motor City is revving up to become a manufacturing hub again, this time for a vehicle that has no motor at all: the bicycle.

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