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« Sawasdee Thai Cafe
» Detroit News Roundup for Friday January 25, 2008

Detroit News Roundup for December


The Jazzy Cafe enchants Harmonie Park

The Jazzy Cafe is a large part of the recent resurgence of street level shops in Harmonie Park. Mike obtained the space in May of 2006 his background in home improvement and plumbing allowed him to do most of the renovations himself. Its a process that took more time but allowed more personality to shine through in the end. The cafe accurately reflects the combination of humility and pure energy found in its creator.

“They consider this home,” Mike says about his most loyal patrons, who stopped what they’re doing to join our interview on the mezzanine of downtown’s newest and friendliest entry into the coffee shop scene. “This is your café, not mine. I just turn the key and turn off the alarm, and it’s poppin’.”

[via Michigan Citizen]

Revived passenger service could boost Detroit’s municipal airport

A planned replacement runway for Detroit’s Coleman A. Young airport is a good start toward upgrading the facility, which has been up and down on its luck for decades.

State and federal officials should expedite the often long approval process that includes environmental and safety surveys. The city-owned airport is an asset with growth potential — and city officials are honing a master plan to grow the airport’s business.

[via DetNews.com]

Selling through the mail boosts wineries-The Grand Rapids Press

LANSING — Wineries, especially those from out of state, have enjoyed some new business opportunities in Michigan’s first full year under a new law regulating shipments of wine directly to customers.

Business has been smooth, but it hasn’t been booming.

[via MLive.com]

The rise of the Motor City Bowl

When the Motor City Bowl was created, many thought it would fail quickly, much like the Cherry Bowl years earlier in Michigan. However, that hasn’t been the case. Marshall kept it exciting for many years in the beginning, and the last two years the biggest goal was accomplished with a team from the state of Michigan in CMU. This year, CMU and Purdue set an attendance record at 60,000, while having the intended match-up of MAC vs. Big Ten. The Motor City Bowl is turning into one of the most successful non-BCS bowl games.

[via MLive.com]

Russia’s Kaluga poised to be Detroit of Europe

December 29, 2007, 13:34 Russia’s Kaluga poised to be Detroit of Europe Russian city of Kaluga, just over a hundred kilometers southwest Moscow, is attracting more and more car giants. French carmaker Peugeot Citroen has already chosen the city for its first assembling plant in Russia. While its major partner, Japan’s Mitsubishi, is widely expected to be the next one.

With the limelight currently on St. Petersburg, famous for attracting international automakers, the Kaluga region is rapidly becoming a major carmaking centre in its own right.

[via RussiaToday]

Michigan’s bestState adds 12 to Lansing’s Walk of Fame-Kalamazoo Gazette

LANSING — Boxing great Joe Louis and hockey Hall of Famer Gordie Howe are among the 2007 inductees to the Michigan Walk of Fame.

They are among 12 people to be honored on the sidewalk display, in downtown Lansing just a few blocks from the state Capitol. The project honors past and present state residents who have made significant contributions to the state, nation or world.

[via MLive.com]

Ann Arbor firms invest $100m in job growth-Michigan Business Review

The entrepreneurial climate in Ann Arbor got a meaningful boost this year as economic development officials sought to encourage the proliferation of new companies in the wake of Pfizer Inc.’s decision to leave the city.

Almost $100 million in investment announced in 2007 eventually will fund 2,248 jobs in this region, according to data from Ann Arbor SPARK.

[via MLive.com]

True tacos

Where do you go when you’re hungry for a taco? If you’re rolling in dough you might hop on a plane and spend a couple days in Mexico City, the burgeoning culinary destination praised by foodies around the world for its mixture of traditional and contemporary regional cuisine. Most likely you’re going to drive through a corner fast food joint and get what is basically a variation on every other menu item offered at the place.

A realistic alternative is a short trip to southwest Detroit and Taquera La Tapatia. You can order a variety of tacos prepared in the traditional manner: two soft and warm house-made corn tortillas topped with a choice of meat and garnished with fresh cilantro and onion. Choose among five tacos all priced at one dollar but don’t suppose any will be ground beef.

[via Detroit Metro Times]

Dearborn Launches Residential Campaign

DEARBORN, Mich. (AP) - The city is getting into the business of selling itself.

A Web site and a marketing blitz aimed at attracting new residents to Dearborn are the main components of the $300,000 campaign. It will include ads in relocation guides, magazines and newspapers and on radio.

[via WXYZ]

The Biggest Mies Collection

On the edge of downtown Detroit, just east of the Chrysler Freeway and not far from Detroit’s still-troubled neighborhoods, lies Lafayette Park, one of the nation’s most beautiful — and most obscure — residential developments. Composed of three sections — a high-rise apartment building and 21 multiple-unit townhouses on the western border, 13 acres of landscaping down the center, and twin apartment towers on the east — Lafayette Park holds the largest collection of buildings in the world designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe.

Called “oft-overlooked” by the Harvard Design School and “a little-known jewel of modern urbanism” by Detlef Mertins, a professor of architecture at the University of Pennsylvania, it should be renowned, both for its loveliness and for its ability to thrive through Detroit’s dark times of riots, destruction and middle-class flight.

Lafayette Park is certainly one of Mies’s finest and most surprising works. For while he incorporated many of his favorite themes — exposed steel, glass curtains, small interior spaces — the result is welcoming and serene rather than harsh.

[via Wall Street Journal]

Cafe attraction

For months, the banner announcing the opening of Cafe Con Leche Coffee Shop in the new Mexicantown Mercado marketplace beckoned would-be customers.

Then, one day in December — to the delight of those customers — a neon “open” sign welcomed them in. The open, airy, caf on Bagley is one of two true coffee shops in southwest Detroit, a business leader said.

The café’s early December opening was a “soft” one, Rodriguez said. A grand opening will be held later.

“We need to get the word out,” she said.

The Mercado has six of its 12 retail spaces filled. A restaurant will bookend the Mercado as the second anchor, opposite the café, Rodriguez said.

[via Detroit Free Press]

Detroit’s own Hair Wars gets coffee-table book treatment

There are hairstylists who can whip up a ‘do sure to turn heads, but in the Motor City, our hairstylists are known for creating coiffures that stop traffic.

Several times a year, at events called Hair Wars, which make a stop Jan. 20 at the Northfield Hilton in Troy, strong-necked models walking down a runway balance everything from luxury cars and motorcycles to birds, flowers and even barbecue grills on their heads — all crafted from human and synthetic hair.

[via DetNews.com]

Urbane Apartments Offers Upscale Rental Options in Berkley, Michigan

Royal Oak, Michigan (PRWEB) December 20, 2007 — The progressive Urbane Apartments group has opened Urbane on Catalpa, located on Catalpa Road in downtown Berkley, a northern Detroit suburb that has seen significant revitalization in the last decade.

The 16-unit building features true loft-style, one-bedroom, and spacious two-bedroom apartments with modern design features such as hardwood floors, top-hung rolling doors, black appliances, granite counter tops, glass french balconies, home office nooks, and dual rain heads in the bathrooms. All Urbane residents enjoy free high-speed wireless internet access and an online hub that allows for electronic rent payments and maintenance requests.

[via PR Web (press release)]

Detroit residential sales up 4 percent over last November, most …

Detroits residential home sales increased month-over-month again for November, showing a 4 percent increase over 2006, according to Farmington Hills-based RealComp II Ltd.

During November, 723 homes and condominiums were sold in Detroit compared with 845 sales in Oakland County, and 504 sales in Macomb County.

In pending sales, those considered imminent, Detroit showed a 27 percent increase for November 2007 compared with 2006.

November’s numbers continued the hot streak for the city, which saw residential sales increase month-over-month for eight months in 2007.

The increase is attributable to a combination of demand from young, urban pioneers and out-of-town investors, said Darralyn Bowers, president of Southfield-based ERA Bowers and Associates, which does a majority of its sales in Detroit.

[via Crain’s Detroit Business]

Vibrant downtown Detroit wins over marketing firm

After nearly 18 months of searching for a new headquarters, our company last month took occupancy of our offices in the One Kennedy Square building at Campus Martius Park.

The kind of spirit among the companies here does not exist in any other place.

[via DetNews.com]

DJ ASSAULT

Detroit’s DJ Assault is often viewed as the godfather of ghettotech but don’t tell that to him.

“I never supported that name for my music. It was always just booty music to me,” Assault aka Craig De Shan Adams aka Craig Diamonds said on the phone from his Detroit lair. “The ghetto tracks were all stuff for the clubs that weren’t in the best part of the city. That’s where the ghetto name came from. I guess people talked to some magazines and whatever. It’s really kind of silly.”

[via WeeklyDig.com]

Detroit riverwalk aided

The action allows federal grant money to be used to improve that area.

The Uniroyal parcel, south of Jefferson Avenue just west of the bridge, is a former industrial site that has stood vacant for more than 20 years.

[via Detroit Free Press]

Asian influence

Thor, who immigrated to Hamtramck nearly 30 years ago and then graduated from Wayne State University and the University of Michigan, was the keynote speaker at last week’s Asian Pacific American Leadership Summit held at the Westin Hotel in Southfield. About 100 people — students, professionals, activists and board members — attended the summit dinner.

Representing groups such as Council of Asian Pacific Americans, the Asian Pacific Islander Vote-Michigan and the Detroit Area Youth Project, the attendees offered their own observations and advice about some of the political dynamics about the Asian-American community.

[via Detroit Metro Times]

Model D-troiter: Rufus Bartell

The name of the store is Simply Casual. If you don’t understand what that means, take a look at owner Rufus Bartell, clad in a classic suit updated with wraparound cufflinks and distressed city boots, seated on a Victorian armchair that’s part of his store’s central conversational grouping.

For the fashion-forward shopper, Bartell has it all premium jeans, this season’s tunic length tops, classic dress shirts, cocktail frocks … it’s a lifelong love affair with fashion, manifest in this Livernois storefront.

[via Model D]

Dalai Lama to Give Special Teaching in Ann Arbor, Michigan

ANN ARBOR, Mich., Dec. 10 /PRNewswire/ — On Saturday and Sunday, April 19 and 20, 2008, His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama will visit Ann Arbor to teach “Engaging Wisdom and Compassion” at Crisler Arena on the University of Michigan campus. The two-day program (http://www.dalailamaannarbor.com) with two sessions April 19, and one session April 20, is jointly sponsored by Jewel Heart (http://www.jewelheart.org), a Tibetan Buddhist Center headquartered here, The Tibet Fund (http://www.tibetfund.org), and the Garrison Institute (http://www.garrison.org).

[via PR Newswire (press release)]

A safe ride home in your own car

That’s why many companies around metro Detroit are signing up for a new designated-driver program that takes intoxicated workers home in their own cars.

The Designate — the Birmingham-based firm that offers the service — sends out two drivers to meet clients. One takes the worker home in his or her own car, the other trails behind to pick up the driver. The company can also arrange for workers to be driven from location to location in their own car.

[via Detroit Free Press]

Michigan ACLU chapter buys building in Midtown Detroit

Other Crain’s Sites Crain’s Chicago Business Crain’s Cleveland Business Crain’s New York Business Automotive News Advertising Age Crain Communications Inc.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan is buying a building in Midtown as part of an expansion that will include doubling its staff and opening a satellite office in Grand Rapids.

[via Crain’s Detroit Business]

Plans for $142 million horse racing park unveiled

HURON TOWNSHIP - A new $142 million horse racing park that will open in July in Huron Township near Detroit Metropolitan Airport will produce 1,400 jobs and be a “family business,” according to the developer and local officials.

Details about the race track, to be called Pinnacle Race Course, were outlined by developers Jerry Campbell and his wife, Felicia (Lisa), at a news conference held Friday at the township hall. The race course in the southwest corner of Wayne County will be Michigan’s only thoroughbred race course when it begins racing July 18, Mr. Campbell told about 100 people crammed into the board room.

[via Monroenews.com]

A chance to build up Detroit

“I’ve had a lot of comments, ‘You’re from Grand Rapids. What are you doing here?’ ” developer Marcel Burgler said recently.

A native of the Netherlands who settled in Grand Rapids many years ago, Burgler said he hears the same sort of questions from his friends in western Michigan about investing in Detroit.

[via Detroit Free Press]

Detroit native rescues downtown Albion theater

One month after shutting its doors, the Bohm Theater in downtown Albion is back open for business, showing first-run movies.

Fears the historic theater would be vacant for a long time proved unfounded. A new owner came forward almost immediately. Charles Karabes, a Detroit native and owner of 4 Wall Entertainment of Des Moines, Iowa, has already started renovating the building and said he intends to buy it.

[via MLive.com]

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« Sawasdee Thai Cafe
» Detroit News Roundup for Friday January 25, 2008