News Release

UDM’s Detroit Collaborative Design Center Presents “Light-Up Livernois” Event - 5/31-6/1

Business leaders and community stakeholders in Detroit’s Livernois Avenue community are joining together to celebrate local businesses and culture on Detroit’s Avenue of Fashion with a new Pop-Up community space.

The Livernois Community Storefront is a temporary community space that occupies a vacant storefront at 19410 Livernois Avenue. The location will serve as a welcome center for the Avenue of Fashion, Livernois Avenue’s business district and will hold community events.

“Light-Up Livernois” will kickoff the community storefront with a festive weekend full of fun on Friday, May 31 and Saturday June 1, 2013. Friday evening will feature a fashion show of Livernois clothiers, music and art from the neighborhood. Saturday’s activities will include yoga, paint-your-own pottery, a fashion workshop, theatre and a parade down Livernois. Local artists and food vendors will participate on both days.

“There are gems all over the City of Detroit,” said Dan Pitera, Executive Director, DCDC. “Livernois Avenue with its surrounding communities is one of them,” he added. “The Livernois Community Storefront represents a community driven action and is not the end goal. It will connect and bring awareness to many of the assets within this Detroit gem."

Through its Impact Detroit initiative, and in partnership with Detroit Economic Growth Corporation's Revolve Detroit and Challenge Detroit, the Detroit Collaborative Design Center (DCDC) at the University of Detroit Mercy School of Architecture is spearheading the Livernois Community Storefront project on the Avenue of Fashion.

Tentative event itinerary:

Friday, May 31

6 p.m. – Storefront open w/ music, art and Livernois businesses open late
7 p.m. – Remarks from organizers and participants
8 p.m. – Fashion Show
10 p.m. – Close

Saturday, June 1

10 a.m. – Yoga
11 a.m. – 1 p.m. – Livernois Community Parade, begins at Mike’s Fresh Market
1-3 p.m. – Paint Your Own Pottery with We Are Clay/Art in Motion
3 p.m. – DIY Fashion workshop
5 p.m. – Theater Performance by Extra Mile Playwrights
6 p.m. – Close

For more information on “Light-Up Livernois,” contact Ceara O’Leary, Project Manager, DCDC, at 313-993-1037 (olearycm@udmercy.edu) or visit the Livernois Community Storefront page at www.facebook.com/LivernoisCommunityStorefront.

Release date: May 13, 2013

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