Detroit’s $28 million test of keeping artists in the neighborhood

By Olivia Hart

Blueprint Creative Group CEO and real estate developer Fabiola Fleuranvil paid $350,000 for a 138-unit residential building in Detroit’s Russell Woods/Nardin Park on March 13, 2020. Six years later, she is working to turn the property into a 77-unit, $28 million development.

What is Fleuranvil building in Detroit?

The purchase closed the day before much of the country went into COVID lockdown. Detroit’s Strategic Neighborhood Fund has earmarked Russell Woods/Nardin Park for redevelopment through a $262 million leveraged investment in new public and private development, commercial corridors, affordable housing and parks.

In 2019, the Miami native had sought out-of-state opportunities and taken a day trip to Detroit. Fleuranvil said: “The only prior knowledge that I had of Detroit was just what everyone typically has of Detroit with the issues from the 2016, 2017.” She was referring to the post-manufacturing years and Detroit’s 2013 bankruptcy.

She points to Detroit’s deep creative identity in music, Black arts and literature, architecture and design. Her model treats creative people, spaces and cultural history as parts of one neighborhood ecosystem.

She tested it in Miami’s Liberty City. Fleuranvil said: “I had a proof of concept in Miami where myself and a few other friends put money together and invested in Liberty City. And immediately I felt like, um, I could scale that in the Detroit market because I had a built environment that could work for that.”

She added: “I saw women, I saw Black developers, I saw young developers, and that is not what I saw or still see in South Florida.” She says Detroit offers a broader developer base for the model.

Urban studies theorist Richard Florida says creative people add direct value to cities through innovation and ideas. Fleuranvil put it more personally: “Artists because of how they’re wired creatively … are able to see beyond what [most people can] see.” She added: “They’re willing to come in and help build up a neighborhood.”

Fleuranvil draws inspiration from Liberty City and Wynwood, which now combines culture with a growing startup community. She says she is not intentionally creating an arts district; she wants to preserve music, literature, architecture and art while supplying affordable infrastructure for artists and micro-entrepreneurs.

Her Detroit pitch broadens creative real estate into a community-development model, but it still depends on execution.

How is the corridor changing?

Fleuranvil said: “I’ve also aligned with three other developments within a 10 block corridor stretch.” Her building sits before a $10 million city streetscape project that runs about three quarters of a mile north. Her next three projects sit on that same stretch.

She says the corridor once held Minor Key, one of Detroit’s most important jazz cafés. Diana Ross and the Supremes lived and performed in the area, which sits about three miles from the entrepreneurship hub TechTown.

Fleuranvil has disclosed no rent schedule, financing mix or affordability covenant for the conversion project. Her affordability promise therefore remains an objective, not a documented housing condition.

Public money supports the setting; the project still must show that it keeps artists in place.

What does Detroit learn from Wynwood?

For an outsider, trust comes first, Fleuranvil says. She said of Miami: “I think [in] Miami when the city is building … I don’t think they build with the people in mind,” adding that the city focuses on maximizing profits. “They’re building through the people and around the people, but not with the people. That’s a big difference.”

Fleuranvil points to 2009, when the late developer Tony Goldman led the Wynwood Walls project. She says street artists transformed blank factory walls into street art, drawing galleries, restaurants and retail; she calls that phase Wynwood 2.0.

Large companies and startups define her Wynwood 3.0. She warned: “The artist community built that up, and what you’re experiencing now is a lot of displacement in pricing out of those who were in the early stages of building Wynwood.”

In Russell Woods/Nardin Park, Fleuranvil hosts community engagement meetings and treats the city as a partner. Those meetings shape her approach, but no binding protections for artists or micro-entrepreneurs are disclosed.

Her Detroit model differs in process, but not yet in proven financial outcome.

What goes into the Bakehouse concept?

One corridor project would acquire three historic commercial buildings from the city. Fleuranvil said: “One of the projects that I have on that corridor is three historic commercial buildings that I’m acquiring from the city. It’ll be a Bakehouse art complex concept.”

The idea takes its name from Wynwood’s Bakehouse Art Complex, a nonprofit incubator for artistic creativity. Fleuranvil describes the plan:

• Shared artist studios for emerging artists, with “keeping the rent super low, so essentially subsidizing the rent by increasing the number of tenancies I can have there,” Fleuranvil said.
• A gallery where artists can show their work and host community events.
• A food hall for food and beverage micro-entrepreneurs, with built-out kitchens and shared front and back of house space.

She calls the food hall a turnkey setup that lets operators drastically reduce startup costs. The city acquisition price, business rents and opening timetable are not disclosed.

The concept lowers entry costs, but tenant prices remain unknown.

Who provides the financing?

Fleuranvil sees local finance as central to the model. She said: “Detroit has a strong presence of community development financing institutions (CDFIs).” These mission-based lenders invest in and lend to small businesses, supporting both development and startups.

Her advice is to look beyond conventional debt. Entrepreneurs should seek “alternative sources of financing tools that could be available,” Fleuranvil says, so they do not miss local options.

She also learned that developers and cities must work together beyond real estate. Fleuranvil said: “They’re a big partner in how the startup community really gets entrenched in how it scales.” Local government can supply “tools … philanthropic dollars … and financing,” she added.

Fleuranvil says city government wants communities to prosper and recognizes it cannot achieve that alone. She notes that her area has received little recent commercial investment.

Her answer is to mix arts, culture and micro-entrepreneurship so residents can also work nearby. She wants Russell Woods/Nardin Park to be approachable to everyone, unlike Wynwood.

Detroit supplies local lenders and public tools; neither guarantees affordable space without project-level terms.