The Blue Bird Inn, an institute of Detroit music and a hearth of the Black community, has been designated a local Historic District by the City of Detroit. We received the final notice of designation on December 7th. The official, unanimous vote was held on October 6th by City Council and then signed by the Mayor’s office.
You may read the final report here.
The historic designation, in addition to creating a lasting historical record and documenting years of community engagement, guarantees that any significant changes to the property — including demolition — will now have to go before the City of Detroit’s Historic District Commission. This designation then ensures an ongoing public, democratic process of historic oversight that the community may avail itself. This is important because in 2019 the City of Detroit sold the building to Detroit Sound Conservancy with no notice that the building had been deemed “dangerous” by City Council in 2017 and had already been slated for demolition. Once that fact was discovered, we immediately asked for an interim historic designation in order to restore local historical due process.
Our next step will be a capital campaign campaign in early 2021 to secure a new roof for the building. In the meantime, we encourage the public to support our organization’s ongoing mission to preserve Detroit music history with an end-of-year donation here. Donors may also become sustaining supporters via Patreon here.
