We’ve got you covered

DSC02766_tonemapped, photo by ansonredford.

I thought I’d feature a photo from our Michigan Cover Photos Group. You can add pics to it if you want to have them featured on our Michigan in Pictures Facebook and also the Absolute Michigan Facebook.

Recently we featured Donald’s photo of one of the sculptures on the Wayne County Courthouse. This is one of four that depict Law, Commerce, Agriculture, and Mechanics. They were executed by sculptor J. Massey Rhind.

Check it out background bigtacular and see some more including an amazing HDR of the courrthouse in Donald’s slideshow.

Remembering Michigan’s legendary architect Albert Kahn

Albert Kahn’s legacy, photo by .brianday.

“Architecture is 90 percent business and 10 percent art.”
~Albert Kahn

Legendary Detroit architect Albert Kahn died on December 8, 1942. The Albert Kahn entry at Wikipedia begins:

Kahn was born on March 21, 1869 in Rhaunen, Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. Kahn came to Detroit in 1880 at the age of 11. His father Joseph was trained as a rabbi. His mother Rosalie had a talent for the visual arts and music. As a teenager, he got a job at the architectural firm of Mason and Rice. Kahn won a year’s scholarship to study abroad in Europe, where he toured with another young architecture student, Henry Bacon, who would later design the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C.

The architectural firm Albert Kahn Associates was founded in 1895. He developed a new style of construction where reinforced concrete replaced wood in factory walls, roofs, and supports. This gave better fire protection and allowed large volumes of unobstructed interior. Packard Motor Car Company’s factory built in 1907 was the first development of this principle.
The success of the Packard plant interested Henry Ford in Kahn’s designs. Kahn designed Ford Motor Company’s Highland Park plant, begun in 1909, where Ford consolidated production of the Ford Model T and perfected the assembly line. On Bob-Lo Island, Henry Ford had a dance hall designed and built by Albert Kahn, which was billed as the second largest in the world in a 1903 account…

Ten Albert Kahn designed buildings are recognized with Michigan historical markers:

• Battle Creek Post Office
• The Dearborn Inn
• Detroit Arsenal Tank Plant in Warren, Michigan
• Edsel and Eleanor Ford House in Grosse Pointe Shores, Michigan
• Fisher Building
• Delta Upsilon Fraternity, 1331 Hill St., Ann Arbor
• Packard Motor Car Company factory
• The Detroit News
• The Detroit Free Press
• Willow Run

Get the complete list of his firm’s buildings (including the Russell Industrial Center) at Wikipedia. The company that Kahn founded in 1895 is still in the business. There’s an interesting biography of Albert Kahn from Ford that notes that a Detroit sculptor recognized Albert’s artistic talent and allowed him to attend his art school free. However, after discovering that Kahn was color blind, the artist encouraged him to become an architect and secured him a job as an office boy.

Check this photo out bigger and see more in Brian’s Detroit Flavor slideshow. Coincidentally enough, Brian just let me know that this photo is being hung in a gallery today along with 10 other prints from Brian (and another 10 from two other michpics regulars,  Jon DeBoer and Jeff Gaydash) at Studio Couture gallery, 1433 Woodward Avenue. Opening night for the exhibition will be this Saturday from 6pm-9pm. Details right here!

More Michigan architects & architecture from Michigan in Pictures.

Brighter Days Ahead

Brighter Days Ahead, photo by Kim.Kozlowski.

Great sentiment, great photo. Learn about the Renaissance Center on Michigan in Pictures.

Check it out bigger and in Kim’s Detroit Slideshow.

fall in detroit

fall in detroit, photo by buckshot.jones.

Color touring and fall fun isn’t only for Northern Michigan – check out the Detroit Fall Color Tour on Pure Michigan, which begins:

The home of the Motown Sound is the starting point for a 195-mile fall color route that skirts three waterways to the maritime city of Port Huron, and rolls through historic Southeast Michigan towns with connections to three pop music stars. The month of October is prime for viewing autumn hues at a variety of parks, and stopping to taste seasonal treats at cider mills along the way

Read on for more!

Check it out background big and in Scott’s Cass Corridor slideshow.

More Fall Wallpaper on Michigan in Pictures.

What Was There, Michigan Edition

Princess Theatre, Detroit photo courtesy WhatWasThere

The other day I came across a new website called WhatWasThere. This innovative project ties historical photos to Google Maps and Google street views so you can see what was there. You can browse around a map, zooming in and out and then click on photos. The site lays them over the Google street view and lets you fade the old photo to reveal what’s there now!

Unsurprisingly, Detroit has the best coverage so far, and it’s pretty cool to see how sites like Woodward Ave looking north at Jefferson (location of the Spirit of Detroit) or Griswold Street have changed. Water Winter Wonderland (a cool site in its own right) has a sweet shot of the interior of the Princess and says that the Princess Theatre was shuttered in 1922 and located at 520 Woodward. That’s the present site of the old Comerica Bank HQ. At another of my favorite sites for old photos, Shorpy, you can get this photo bigger and even buy a print!

Here’s the link to WhatWasThere for Michigan.  There’s not a whole lot of photos to be found (yet) outside Detroit, but one of the coolest things is that you can add your own historical photos, so the site is only going to get better. There are some definite gems though – be sure to check out Grand Rapids City Hall, the seriously cool looking Lansing Masonic Temple at the site of Cooley Law School and the not very much changed Front St in Marquette. A surprising hot spot is Port Huron – check out Sperry’s Department Store to get going.

The Fisher Building in Detroit

iPhone Fisher, photo by Trovarsi

The Detroit News Rearview Mirror feature on the Fisher Building in Detroit begins:

When the seven Fisher Brothers of Fisher Body fame hired architect Albert Kahn in 1927 to design a building that would bear their name, they gave him a blank check and the instructions to build “the most beautiful building in the world.” Plans for a $35 million three-phase project were announced by the brothers in January of 1927. The original program called for three units to be built over a period of several years, but due to the onset of the Great Depression in 1929, only phase one, the Fisher Building, was completed at a cost of $10 million.

The site the brothers had selected for the structure was bounded by West Grand Boulevard, Lothrop Avenue, Third Avenue and Second Boulevard, across from the General Motors building. They originally wanted to build downtown but were unable to put together a suitable parcel of land. They turned to the General Motors area where the idea for a New Center was born.

Read on and see some cool photos at the Detroit News. You can also check out the Fisher Building on Emporis and the Fisher Building on Wikipedia, which notes that the building contains the 2,089 seat Fisher Theatre, a National Historic Landmark, and it is also the location of the headquarters for the Detroit Public Schools. More about Albert Kahn on Michigan in Pictures.

Check this out bigger and in Ryan’s Detroit slideshow.

More architecture from Michigan in Pictures.

Boulderdash: Charlevoix’s Earl Young Houses

Boulderdash, photo by hausfrau23.

A few month’s ago on Absolute Michigan we featured the quirky & amazing Earl Young and his Charlevoix cottages. One of the articles we linked to from the Freep in 1973 said:

Stone houses seem to sprout as naturally as dandelions from the soil of this pleasant Lake Michigan resort community.

And they do because of an already legendary 84-year-old man named Earl A. Young, who built them all.

For more than half a century Young has combed lonesome fields and dusty quarries searching for the odds and ends of nature. He blends stones and timber with an architect’s skill and a geologist’s respect for his raw material, and so far he has fitted more than 40 local landscapes with his art.

“l have a very strong feeling for stone,” Young explained recently as he sat in his wood-paneled office on the lower level of one of his most flamboyant creations, the Weathervane Inn, a local restaurant.

“Stones have their own personalities. People say I’m crazy when I say so, but they really do. Why I found a stone that weighed 160 tons. It was formed 350 million years ago at the bottom of a warm sea and was carried here 10,000 years ago by glaciers.”

Click through for lots more and links to great resources for seeing some of these architectural oddities including the Earl Young Collection at the Charlevoix Library and Park Avenue Prowl, which has a walking guide.

Check this out big as a boulder and in hausfrau23′s Up North Vacation – September 2010 slideshow.

Atop Jackson’s Golden Towers

Art Deco Tower with Antennas, photo by benft.

Jackson County says:

The 17-story Tower Building was built in 1929 for the new Union and Peoples National Bank. The Tower Building was at that time referred to as the “Golden Towers.”

…In 1975 it was sold to the County for a nominal sum by the Raymond Kolowich family and became the County Tower Building. The County Commissioners’ Chamber is located on the 2nd floor up the marble flight of stairs. Italian leaded stained glass windows surround the chamber which was originally the main banking area.

At the top there is a “Falcon Cam” that is trained on the nest of a peregrine falcons! Click through to watch the chicks grow up!

Check this photo out bigger and in Ben’s cool architecture slideshow.

More architecture and more from Jackson on Michigan in Pictures!

Made in Detroit … by Bill Schwab

Detroit, photo by Bill Schwab.

Settle back and enjoy Bill’s Made in Detroit slideshow.

More black & white photography on Michigan in Pictures…

spirit of detroit redux

spirit of detroit redux | detroit, michigan, photo by s o u t h e n

Michigan in Pictures has more about the Spirit of Detroit by Marshall Fredericks and you can take a step inside the lobby of the Guardian Building.

You can see Ryan’s photo bigger, in his Detroit slideshow or purchase it right here!