Create NED: A Community Revitalization Project in Northeast Detroit

Allied Media Projects is excited to announce that we are a recipient of ArtPlace America’s 2015 National Grants Program. ArtPlace, one of the nation’s largest philanthropies dedicated to creative placemaking, is investing $500,000 in “CreateNED,” a collaborative community revitalization project by Allied Media Projects with partners RestoreNED (Northeast Detroit/District 3) and The Work Department.

Young Nation, a community partner and ally, has also been awarded a $225,000 grant from ArtPlace for improvements to the Elsmere-Avis Plaza and Market in Southwest Detroit.

ArtPlace selected both recipients from a pool of nearly 1,300 applicants across 48 states and the District of Columbia. In selecting Allied Media Projects and Young Nation as grantees, ArtPlace is recognizing and investing in models of creative placemaking that put the work and vision of long-time residents at the heart of community planning and development, while integrating best practices of art, culture, and participatory design.

Both of the funded projects grow out of many years of grassroots organizing and relationship-building in their respective neighborhoods of Southwest and Northeast Detroit, where they work with dozens of community organizations, block clubs, arts organizations, churches, businesses, and other anchor institutions. Our shared vision is to utilize the ArtPlace grants to foster more equitable, beautiful, and creative communities.

Allied Media Projects: CreateNED

AMP will work with RestoreNED, a coalition of six community-based organizations in Northeast Detroit, and The Work Dept, a design studio that uses human-centered and participatory design, on the new CreateNED project. The project will promote and begin to implement a plan for equitable and creative development in Northeast Detroit, utilizing art, design, and digital communications in the revitalization strategy.

Since 2011, the RestoreNED coalition has conducted an independent land-use planning process that has resulted in a resident-led vision for the district. With support from ArtPlace, the CreateNED project will make the outcomes of this work more visible, both through online channels and communications, and within the built environment through the development of public art and landscape projects in vacant lots and in local parks.

“Through this process, local art and artistic talents will emerge, be recognized, and be celebrated,” said Karen Washington, one of the CreateNED coordinators.

The CreateNED project will include public festivals that promote the revitalization plan, demonstration projects in three city parks, and the distribution of seed grants for resident-led public art and landscape architecture projects. The project will also launch a CreateNED website and related online communications to share and promote a vision for the community’s development, with the goal of incorporating that vision into the City of Detroit’s new Master Plan.

“We are excited to celebrate the vision we established as a community in 2011,” said Pat Bosch, another coordinator of CreateNED. “Now we can activate our plans and use our parks as an anchor point for grassroots, community-led revitalization. We hope to make Northeast Detroit come alive with creative art and landscape projects, and inspire greater appreciation of the beauty and creativity we have within the district.”

Watch below the video about Create NED that we created with Cass Corridor Films:

Young Nation: Elsmere-avis Plaza and Market

With support from ArtPlace, Young Nation, a community partner and ally of AMP, will work with the artists, youth and residents of Southwest Detroit to design a new building, plaza and green space at the intersection of Elsmere and Avis streets in the neighborhood. The project will provide a supportive space for community members, visitors, and artists to create and build socio-economic capital.

Young Nation has been at the forefront of creative revitalization efforts in Southwest Detroit, primarily through its initiative The Alley Project (TAP), a community gallery that displays street art by local youth, while also creating a safe environment to build intergenerational relationships. The Elsmere-Avis Plaza and Market, which is located adjacent to TAP, will greatly expand the initiative’s capacity and role in the neighborhood as a catalyst for cultural development and economic growth.

“The primary goal of our work is reframing the narrative of our communities and helping to form relationships between youth, elders, and community members,” said Erik Howard, founder of Young Nation. “Building out our own physical, permanent space with the Elsmere-Avis Plaza and Market is a big step up for us because it allows us to expand our programming year-round, while also hosting local businesses in the space to help grow entrepreneurial activity in the neighborhood.”