An Unforgettable Vendor Experience! As a vendor at Booth 441…read moress author of"Behind The Badge Her Story for the Detroit Festival of Books, I couldn't have asked for a better event! The energy was electric, foot traffic was steady, and the crowd of passionate book lovers and local readers was fantastic from start to finish. A wonderful celebration of Detroit's literary community. Whether you're an author exhibiting or a reader hunting for your next great book, this is a must-attend event!

One day book event held every year at Eastern Market. This year, was held in Shed 5. 2023 was 6th…read moreAnnual but my first time. Billed as largest book festival in Michigan. Mix of new and used books, some tables of local authors to sign their books, also a few vendors carry vinyl records. Most don't accept credit cards so have cash or Venmo ready. Opened at 10. Arrived at 10:40. All close free parking was taken, so we paid $5 to park in parking structure. There are quite a few lots within the surrounding blocks but don't know if they are free of charge or not. Free admission. Ton of people. Also wandered to some other sheds within EM to check out the wares for sale. Many food trucks and locally sourced produce. Everyone seemed to be spending money and enjoying themselves. Great way to support the local economy!

There was a time when the Metro area Jewish population was booming. And those who were successful…read moretended to become involved with the Federation - think William Davidson, Max Fisher... And the Federation is a wonderful organization. It provides all sorts of social services to the elderly (low rent housing), people with special needs, people down on their luck, etc. There are also services for new arrivals to the area, like a trial membership to the JCC, and help in connecting with locals. And there are all sorts of social events, from benefit galas, to young professional bar nights. I've found the social events to be very amusing, but I intend to become involved on the charitable end of things if I ever make a living (if they will take money from a lost soul like me). I just hope that they can weather the flight of young adults from Detroit, and the approaching disappearance of the older generation of stalwarts.

Since this is Yelp I'm going to make this about me before I get around to actually reviewing this…read moregallery. Hit me up with that First to Review digital badge! Waahoo! Yelp needs to start giving us reviewers some credit for creating listings, too, since I did that groundwork here and have a few other times, too. I didn't bother with hours cause the last several times I've tried to be thorough and helpful like that the app has glitched out and gone back to square one without saving. Playground Detroit Gallery has been around a few years at list so it's about time it gets dragged onto this hellsite. I recently attended an opening for the supremely talented Zoe Beaudry here which was my first visit in 4 or 5 years. I'm not entirely sure why it had fallen off my radar. It's a bit smaller than HatchArt and a lot smaller than the Annex Gallery but it seems like it should be in my regular rotation with those galleries. No playground equipment outside and there's a lot of green space around here in the east side just outside Eastern Market so I feel like they dropped the ball there but whatever. Hours are 12-5 Thursday through Saturday so that might have something to do with why I don't visit anywhere near as often as my top two galleries. And I know it's there but there's almost nothing in the way of signage so maybe engage that Google Maps if you're trying to find Playground for the first time. This gallery is narrow with the feel of a shotgun house. You might find a DJ table set up in the living room/gallery. The beverages, adult and water are around the bend in the kitchen (no hors d'oeuvres at the last opening) with the bathrooms in the back. It can get crowded for openings. I thought even getting unobstructed pictures of Zoe's fabulous art was going to be highly challenging but a bunch of people went outside for air or left and suddenly I was good. It's been so long since I'd been to any other shows at Playground that their memories are pretty faded in the old noggin and the photo archives only helped so much. One was pretty good and the other was a student art show I think. It was pretty meh but it's important there's venues for that sort of thing. It's good this gallery is where it is cause there's precious few spaces like this on this side of town. I can't give it 5 stars like HatchArt but I'm going to try to be better about supporting it.

Still being up at 5:20 am, after watching Westworld and browsing the internet and diving into…read morewriting a Yelp review about a place I've been to exactly once four months ago... welcome to week three of quarantine. But enough about me, right? The Roush Automotive Retail Store and Museum is a hidden gem in Livonia, a large square shaped Detroit suburb that isn't known for too much. I've lived in the Detroit Metro area my whole life, over 40 years, and never even knew this impressive place was here until maybe five years ago when a friend who works in the industry and I were having a discussion about motorsports that led to him regaling me with the tale of how awesome this little known Roush museum is. I never sought it out then, but stored that nugget in a little recess in the back of my head, and when I found myself on the west side of town with some time to spare I put the ol' Googler on my phone to use and tracked it down. This museum is housed in a plain looking cavernous warehouse on a non-descript industrial drive. Look for the little blue awnings. The street is dotted with other Roush buildings. Roush, by the way, is named after Jack Roush aka The Cat in the Hat, known for the Panama hat he habitually sports at NASCAR races and other motorsports events. It's a performance and racing division of Ford. Now, this is a big building, but it's no Henry Ford Museum. You could probably make your way through the array of autos in half an hour if you wanna breeze through, or more like an hour or so if you wanna gawk over them and take too many photos like me. Fortunately, you won't find the hefty admission price of the Henry Ford here. In fact, it's absolutely free! (That might have been one reason why Todd's tale remained lodged in my noggin after several years.) Plenty of Mustangs of all sorts rest in here, along with Thunderbirds, GTs and concept cars and racecars from way back in the day to modern times. You'll find NASCARs, NASTrucks, pace cars, old school open wheel racers and GTs from touring series like you might have seen in Ford v Ferrari. It's fun seeing how some have grease, grime, marred paint jobs from rubbing alongside competitors and even occasionally confetti from victory lane and Sharpied signatures from the driver and crew right on them. There's even a Sharpie sponsored ride in this massive garage. The staff was nothing but friendly on the cold winter weekday I paid my visit with one employee giving me his blessing to ignore how the stairs on an overhead catwalk were roped off so I could get a nice pictorial overview. I didn't ask him either; he saw me snapping away and thought I might like some shots from up there. They even have a pinball and a video game in there. I forget what the video game was, as I didn't play but naturally the pinball was stock car themed. You enter and exit through the gift shop, but it was a soft sell and I didn't buy anything. They could use something cheap like refrigerator magnets for sightseers like me who don't have too deep of pockets. This House of Blue Oval was a nice little adventure for me to end 2019 on, and more people should definitely know about it. Here's hoping all of us get out to have more adventures this year...

What an amazing place and it's absolutely free. So many great cars. If you're a NASCAR fan, this is…read morethe place for you. There are so many different cars and trucks from different NASCAR eras. Cool gift shop. Did I mention it's free?

Carla and Jasmine are the absolute most amazing duo and we couldn't be happier that we had them…read morepart of our wedding at Planterra Conservatory. Every step of the way they made sure our needs and wants were taken into account and they curated such a beautiful mix of songs that left us and our guests in awe. Not only are they fantastically talented musicians they are also friendly, kind, stunning! and made us feel so so special. Thank you Florella for making our wedding ceremony and cocktail hour so magical!!

The ladies did amazing at my birthday party. Everyone was thoroughly impressed and enjoyed their…read moreperformance. Will book again!!

I came here to see my goddaughter perform in her recital with the Detroit Dance Center. The…read morefacility itself is really nice and HUGE. It's part of the Grosse Pointe North H.S. complex and finding the parking entrance can be a little tricky. We were running tight on time and after looping around a bit I was afraid I would be late. Luckily,kids are not exactly the easiest to get to start on time so we were comfortably seating as it was beginning. This is one of the few HS theatres in the area that has a balcony, which is where my friend and my goddaughter's whole crew were seating (I'm pretty sure we bought out the whole section), and the view was great. I wasn't involved in any of the tech for the performance or anything so I can't speak to that but as a guest and audience member we had a lovely time.

Motor City Pride is an annual gay pride celebration in the Detroit suburb of Ferndale. Typically…read morethe celebration takes place on a blocked-off 9 Mile Road west of Woodward Avenue. 9 Mile Road is filled with vendors including food, LGBT services and organizations, and LGBT friendly businesses and services in the local area. The different booths and vendors have many different offerings to the festival goers. There are usually two stages, one main and one secondary located at different ends of 9 Mile Road. The stages have different acts from local to national musical acts, to drag queens, and even a doggy drag show. There are bleachers set up to watch the stages. Generally, there is one "headlining" act that wraps up the festival around 7 or 8pm. This last year the local cover band "Killer Flamingos" were the headlining act. In addition, the festival features a dance tent, usually sponsored by Necto where the Necto Pride DJs take turn spinning music to a crowded dancefloor. In addition to the temporary booths and stages, the local businesses are all open. There are local stores, restaurants, bars and other businesses open along Woodward. A beer tent is generally set up where one can purchase tickets to purchase beer to drink outdoors all afternoon within the confines of the tent. Normally this is pretty busy and I just avoid it. Normally, Pride is hot and busy. There are a lot of people from all walks of life and they're all walking around in the hot summer sun in humid Michigan. This is one of the biggest Pride festivals in Michigan. Motor City Pride is the first Sunday in June.

While I didn't come to downtown Ferndale today with the intent of participating in Pride, I am glad…read moreI did. I love festivals; ethnic festivals, music festivals, etc, but this is the first time I had been to a Pride festival. What what really struck me here were the number of participants from all walks of life and all orientations that were here and having a good time (except for the literature distributors, and even they were well behaved). Lots of folks and families wandering around after the Rainbow Run as well. The atmosphere is welcoming, relaxed and fun, no matter your orientation. Come with an open mind mind and it is really hard not to enjoy the crowds, the music, the welcoming businesses, and the overall atmosphere. My son is very involved as a rights advocate at his college and I was able to pick him up some support shirts to take back to school with him as well.

It's no longer an International car show but just an American car show. Pics are combined from 2023…read more& 2025. I went 2yrs ago and was so excited that this time, I came with my two nephews. I flew them from MD to MI with me. To my dismay, It was small, not all brands present, no food options, no fun vendors, no games, no real swag, no car accessories to buy, nothing really for the kids, no international cars, no concept cars, the dealers only brought the base model, nothing spectacular. A lot of the cars were locked so you couldn't get in. For Detroit to be the car capital, and they had already skipped a year, this really does put Detroit in a bad light. This was my last year. I found Chicago (last year) to be just as disappointing. I wish I went to both prepandemic so I could see how things were when it was all the hype.

I am so behind in posting this review from 2023…read more We got to the auto show an hour before it closed - enough time to see our top car brands and displays. For me, a visit during the weekday is less stressful - the crowds are thinner, so you can get closer to your favorite vehicles. The focus this year was on EVs. There was even room for car enthusiasts to try out the various brand offerings. We chose not to wait in the short line and instead roamed the floor and jumped in and out of the numerous vehicles on display. We saw impressive displays from the Big 3, a beautiful display from a luxury brand (no concept vehicles this year), a beautiful one-seater race car, and something Batman would drive. We also saw a flying car but no demos, unfortunately. Of course, you go to the auto show for inspiration. Whether it is the shiny pick-up, the SUV that inspires off-roading, or the sporty EV with the huge range, the auto show lets you see yourself in new vehicles. Tickets were available online. I work downtown so I had already parked. However, another benefit of going during the week is the ample parking.