January 31 • 2019 31 jn NEW CENTER IS BACK Was it, therefore, a gamble to open a clothing store in New Center? Lutz responds with a vehement no. What she realized, sitting in the Fisher Building lobby with Rosenzweig, is that a huge population of office work- ers and diverse residential neighbors have been dramatically underserved for years. “The building and the neigh- borhood were bustling, but the busi- ness community missed the memo. ” Rosenzweig says 35,000 daily employees can be found in New Center. “Right now, Corktown is the big deal because of Ford. After Ford moves in, there will be 6,000 daily employees in Corktown. New Center has five, six times more than that already. ” Those populations are growing daily — literally hundreds of new people will be moving into residential devel- opments opening in the next five years. “If you’ re looking to open a business today, you should be looking at New Center, ” Rosenzweig insists. The way Lutz sees it, those still-emp- ty storefronts are a tremendous business, economic development and urban planning opportunity. “If nobody occupies these storefronts, ” she reasons, “then nothing in these neigh- borhoods will change. ” That said, she pays tremendous respect to her retail neighbors, like the Fashion Place and Russel’ s Pharmacy, that held down the fort for the neigh- borhood and its underserved foot traf- fic for so many years. She also credits the Platform for its thoughtful, local business-forward redevelopment strategy, and for being wonderful partners in recreating the building’ s image and occupancy inclu- sively and compassionately. The retail corridor emerging with- in the Fisher and New Center more broadly is much loved and lauded by thousands of neighborhood residents and workforce members, and Lutz wants to make sure the broader Metro Detroit business community knows there’ s more demand to meet. Retail can thrive in Detroit and engage in a meaningful conversation about neighborhood development and urban planning at the same time. Every new business makes a measur- able profit and difference. Lutz is hum- ble, but Rosenzweig sings her praises, sharing anecdotes of an elderly couple who drove from Armada to Detroit to see the store, their first time in the city since 1994, and of the other businesses that the Peacock Room has helped to attract and support (“The tailor downstairs, William & Bonnie, is going gangbusters”). “Rachel delivered exactly what we were hoping, which is that new ener- gy, ” he says. One hundred years ago, we built beautiful public spaces in which to work, play and live. We then spent a decade slowly abandoning them, replacing them with surface lots, and plastering them over with drywall and drop ceilings. But good bones, good buildings last, standing in wait for imaginative people to fill them with new community assets. Rachel Lutz and the Peacock Room set a standard for just how thoughtfully and success- fully we can do the work of honoring and refilling those spaces. ■ The photos on the far left from the Detroit Historical Society show the room’ s original look. Today, the space contains vintage clothing, including tophats and bejeweled purses, embossed stationery full of swear words and devotional candles featuring illustrations of James Baldwin and Ruth Bader Ginsburg. CALLI NG F OR Act or s , Si nger s , Dancer s , Vi s ual Ar t i s t s , Mus i ci ans , Cul i nar y Ar t i s t s and T eens i nt er es t ed i n TV/Radi o Pr oduct i on and Repor t i ng! THE 201 9 DETROI T JCC Maccabi ArtsF est I S HOLDI NG AUDI TI ONS at The Ber man Cent er for t he Per for mi ng Ar t s T uesdays, F ebruary 1 2, 1 9 and 26, 201 9 I 6-8 p.m. To pre-register, please email Taliah Ausby, tausby@jccdet.org by February 11 Jewi s h Communi t y Cent er of Met r opol i t an Det r oi t D. Dan & Betty Kahn Building Eugene & Marcia Applebaum Jewish Community Campus 6600 W. Maple Road, West Bloomfield, MI 48322 @MaccabiDetroit201 9 www.maccabidetroit201 9.com maccabi@jccdet.org I 248.934.0889