Sunday Stroll: House Of Contemplation

I struggled with the snarks on this post title... Cathedral of St. Slow's*? New Testament Church of Declare Detroit? Our Lady Queen of Hipsters? In the end the snarks lost and my kinder, gentler self was won over by the Imagination Station itself and Catie Newell's work, Salvaged Landscape  (pictured above). The Imagination Station miniplex, while technically consisting of two abandoned houses, is really made of equal parts bravura marketing, sweat equity, and community organizing, with a dash of wild (and necessary) optimism and a pinch of insane genius.

Located facing Michigan Central Station, one of the houses ... empty, burnt out, and deconstructed, has been transformed into a gallery, art installation, and performance space. On a sunny, unseasonably warm Sunday afternoon a few weeks ago, it seemed full of metaphors and hidden meanings about the city itself. Some of them were obvious, like the rose window/stained glass effect of Newell's centerpiece (first photo).

A side chapel and makeshift stage is formed in an alcove of the Roosevelt hotel, below. The hotel, next to the Imagination Station, was recently purchased by Dennis Keffalinos, who owns the Russell Industrial Center. He also owns numerous rehabbed loft buildings around town, and even more numerous un-rehabbed vacant buildings, many of them historically significant. Some people think his buildings are somewhat, ahem, lightly maintained. Others argue that he is one of the few trying and successfully rehabbing buildings of this scale in the city. 

Below... is this a purposeful vignette on the state of Detroit's industry or just some retro-chic stuff on a ledge?

Other details....

From inside Salvaged Landscape, a vantage point to consider Roosevelt Park's possibilities

On this afternoon, the Imagination Station was quiet. The only sounds were from someone rummaging around in the empty Roosevelt Hotel, and in the distance, the power tools of a man working on the back of the Mercury Bar. Plenty of space and solitude for the hamster wheel in my head to turn.

That's two vacant houses being looked after. I can't help but think of the others with lower profiles ... neighbors who get no press and no thanks for boarding up the vacant houses on their street, for trying to keep trouble away, for calling police who hardly ever come. I see the train of thought... call attention to these two, bootstrap them into something that draws more resources, and make it easier to work on the next two, or two thousand.

*For out-of-towners, Slow's is a wildly popular, delicious, (deservedly) overexposed, BBQ restaurant whose owners are trying to lead a burgeoning revival of the neighborhood.