Design :
Featured Stories
Kim North Shine
Thursday, March 07, 2013
ISCG in Royal Oak has long been designing workplaces for clients with an eye toward rehabilitation and re-use. Last year the firm put its money where its mouth was and became its own client. The building? The discarded Royal Radio building on Main Street. The results speak for themselves.
Kim North Shine
Thursday, January 17, 2013
Homecoming isn't just an event for Rochester's McGowen brothers, it's a philosophy. Over four generations, the family has made their home furnishings and interior design business a place where locals always felt welcome. Returning from stints in L.A., siblings Jonathan and David have decided to pick up the family legacy, opening shops across the street from one another.
Megan O'Connell
Thursday, October 11, 2012
In an economy increasingly tilted towards service businesses, it's Detroit's artisans who are leaving a tangible imprint on the city's culture. Megan O'Connell, founder of Salt & Cedar Letterpress, writes about the unconventional funding of her press, mapping objects and stories, and the press as a cultural cache.
Amy Kuras
Thursday, September 15, 2011
From big box to big ideas. Ferndale's Rust Belt Market is an artist and craft fair, DIY marketplace, and music festival all rolled into one. And it happens day in and day out in a space that formerly housed an Old Navy.
Tanya Muzumdar
Thursday, August 18, 2011
Ben Sharkey leads a truly 3D life. A designer at visualization tech firm Real Time Technology, he moonlights as a honey-smooth jazz vocalist. Okay, so he sings on the side, you say. Still, how many part time jazz singers do you know that boast YouTube fans in the hundreds of thousands?
Natalie Burg
Thursday, February 24, 2011
Lawrence Tech is taking custom manufacturing to the masses. In a unique program that weds digital fabrication to design and community outreach, makeLAB harnesses cutting edge digital technology to produce custom design and architecture where it once wasn't available or affordable.
Jeff Meyers
Thursday, December 16, 2010
If anyone doubts that Metro Detroit is a hotbed of invention, entrepreneurship and creative thinking they just haven't been paying attention. Metromode once again unearthed a treasure trove of people, companies and communities that are evolving our sense of place, building our new economy, and promoting innovation at every turn. As we ring out the year we look back at a baker's dozen of stories that inspired us!
Amy Kuras
Thursday, October 14, 2010
What's the saying about a prophet not being honored in his own country? Lawrence Technological University is living it. The Southfield-based school, well-regarded but sometimes overlooked in the shadows of behemoth state universities, is building a reputation in China by forging partnerships with some of that country's top institutions.
Dave Lewinski
Wednesday, August 04, 2010
Innovation was the name of the game as this past weekend saw hundreds of mad inventors and tens of thousands of watchers descend on Dearborn for Metro Detroit's first ever Maker Faire. There was a life-sized version of Mousetrap, flame-spewing vehicles, singing fish and the world's largest Coke meets Mentos experiment. Metromode's Dave Lewinski was there to capture it in all its crazed glory!
Amy Kuras
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
A hybrid wind mobile. Monster Chess. The Sashimi Tabernacle Choir. Maker Faire is at The Henry Ford this weekend and if you don't know what this cooler than cool event is we'll have to revoke your hipster smartypants license. Metromode previews a trio of local projects featured at this celebration of epic-scale DIY.
Tanya Muzumdar
Thursday, July 15, 2010
When New York fashionistas ask designer Katerina Bocci why she's in Michigan, her reply is: "We are able to make beautiful cars... so why aren't we able to make fashion?" How true! Metromode gets the skinny on Metro Detroit's budding fashion industry - what's here, where it's going, and what it needs.
Dennis Archambault
Thursday, July 01, 2010
For most companies the mantra is: grow big and grow fast. Of course, given the current economy, any growth would be a blessing. But what if slow growth were the long term strategy? With a focus on work/life issues, purpose, and entrepreneurial pride, some Metro Detroit firms have consciously decided they'd rather be the tortoise than the hare.
Dennis Archambault
Thursday, April 29, 2010
Sometimes bigger isn't better. In Ann Arbor the small giant movement is catching on, and it's attracting some Metro Detroit companies as well. Their philosophy? Profit is good but the bottom line should not be the be all / end all of your company's existence.
Tanya Muzumdar
Thursday, April 01, 2010
When he was young, interior designer John Breco couldn't wait to leave Michigan. Now that he's spent a lifetime professionally zig-zagging the country, he's happy to be back in Metro Detroit. And he has a few innovative things to say about local aesthetics and wind energy turbines. Seriously.
Terry Parris Jr.
Thursday, February 04, 2010
Walking through Royal Oak's downtown, it's hard not to notice the bars, restaurants and shops that have popped up over the last decade. But do you ever wonder what goes on upstairs? Terry Parris Jr. visits Main Street's second story and discovers a community of new economy creatives. And lots of cereal boxes!