Sugar Hill Historic District (Detroit)

For Sugar Hill Historic District in New York City, see Sugar Hill Historic District (New York, New York).

Sugar Hill Historic District
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
U.S. Historic district
Garfield Street, looking east from Woodward. The building to the left is the Garfield Building; the DMC is in the background.
Location	Detroit, Michigan
Built	1946
Architect	Cooper, T.W.,
Architectural style	Beaux Arts, Early Commercial
NRHP reference No.	03000068
Added to NRHP	March 03, 2003

The Sugar Hill Historic District is a historic district in Detroit, Michigan. It is located along three streets: East Forest, Garfield, and East Canfield, between Woodward Avenue on the west and John R. on the east.

History

An apartment on Garfield

Starting in the 1940s, urban renewal in Detroit forced the African-American community living near downtown to move northward. The area east of Woodward where the Detroit Medical Center now stands became the center of the entertainment district. The beautiful building shown in the first photo on the left stood on the south side of Garfield between Woodward and John R. but was torched and demolished in the summer of 2008 either by squatters upset that the neighborhood would soon be revitalized, or as an insurance scam by the owners of the building, as is often the case in the city. An art gallery is purported to be opening on Forest Ave. and one of the dilapidated historic properties on Canfield was recently resurrected as luxury loft condos and office space. Currently, the only occupied buildings on Garfield are the Lofts, The MOCAD and the Garfield Estate on the east end.

The Garfield Building stands at the corner of Woodward and Garfield in the center of the district, as does the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit.

References

East Canfield Street at the corner of John R.