Our Vision

The LOVE Building is an experiment in community-rooted development

Why the LOVE Building?

The LOVE Building grows out of the collective need of six Detroit-based social justice organizations for a permanent, centrally-located, accessible home. While our individual organizational missions vary, we share a vision of cultivating liberation, justice, and joy, for all Detroiters.

The LOVE Building tenant partners are a majority Black and POC-led organizations. Our communities are most often on the receiving end of harmful developments, with few opportunities to shape the built environments in which we live.

We recognize the LOVE Building as a unique opportunity to model a different form of community development than the profit-driven, exclusionary model that is rooted in racism. We need development that provides tangible community benefits, that supports longtime Black residents to remain and thrive in place, that removes barriers of access for disabled residents, that offers free and low-cost resources, and so much more.

The LOVE Building is attempting to embody this different form of development, one that is rooted in community needs. We call it an experiment because we know that we will make attempts that succeed and also fail along the way. We know that we will be learning from all of it and contributing those lessons to the larger movement in Detroit and globally, for more just, livable, thriving places.

An early rendering shows people gathering and socializing at a cafe space.

Architectural rendering by Designing Justice, Designing Spaces

DDP community members and friends huddle together with “power” fists held high, holding brightly colored signs with disability justice and disability pride statements. They are multi-gendered, multiracial, intergenerational, and some use wheelchairs.

Tenant Partner Detroit Disability Power community and friends

What we value:

These values were designed collaboratively by the six LOVE Building Tenant Partners at the beginning of the development process. We intend to keep these values at the center of all the work that we do together as the LOVE Building. We recognize that these values are not distinct, but rather integral to each other.

Visionary Organizing

We are attempting to model the liberated, joyful, and just world in which we want to live, while fighting and dismantling harmful systems at the same time. We are prioritizing the visionary organizing of Black, Brown, Indigenous, Queer, Trans, and Disabled Detroiters.

Accessibility

We are modeling an approach to accessibility that is rooted in love and hospitality, while countering the pervasive ableism of our world. We work to make our space usable and welcoming to people with disabilities and others who are often excluded from social justice organizing.

Intergenerational Wisdom

We are rooted in Detroit’s legacy of activism and the wisdom of those who came before us. We value and work to create spaces where elders, children, and everyone in between can contribute their brilliance.

Creativity

We believe that liberation is a creative process. We are providing a gathering space for artists, performers, cultural producers, and all people to do the creative work of social transformation.

Community Accountability

We begin by listening. We are cultivating an environment of trust by always being transparent, self-reflective, and responsive to community needs.

Environmental Responsibility

We are committed to practices, such as solar energy and green infrastructure, that minimize our impact on the environment and cultivate healthy communities for future generations.

Place-Keeping

We are committed to honoring the legacy and present reality of Core City as a majority Black and Brown neighborhood through archiving, oral history and remembrance practices, in addition to participating in local organizing to hold new developments accountable to existing residents’ needs and resisting displacement.

Meet the team

We pride ourselves on our close-knit, powerhouse team of seven. Each member brings a unique set of skills and an intentional approach to everything we do. Together, we’re dedicated to making a meaningful impact and bringing our vision to life.