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October 12-15, Detroit
For a full agenda, go to creativecitiessummit.com
Creative Cities Summit 2.0 is Produced by Creative Cities Productions and the Michigan State Housing Development Authority's Cool Cities team.
Stop at Detroit's Park Bar on any given evening and you'll see entrepreneurs like Canine to Five owner Liz Blondy, tastemakers like Bureau of Urban Living founder Claire Nelson, storytellers like writer Kelli Kavanaugh. You'll see owner Jerry Belanger, who worked with local craftsmen to restore this Albert Kahn building at Park and Elizabeth into the Park Bar and Cliff Bell's jazz club. Belanger very deliberately created a place that's authentically Detroit — a relaxed, social, neighborhood bar.
“You walk into the Park Bar and you see 20 people in jeans and T-shirts, and you never know anything about them, but they've all made significant contributions to the creative community here,” said Jill Ferrari, an executive project manager in Wayne County Executive Robert Ficano's office, and head of the office's creative economy initiative.
But just as the Park Bar has no sign outside to identify it from the street, Detroit's creative community runs just a little under the radar. It's part of the allure of Detroit, and part of the problem.
“Creative young people moving into the city want passion and creative density,” Ferrari said. “They want to figure out who they are and be around other creative people. It's about meeting other young, creative people who've made the sacrifice to come to Detroit and tough it out. Our goal should be to help them find that creative density and understand what's here.”
Well, creative density, here we come.
Creative Cities Summit 2.0 comes to Detroit Oct. 12-15, bringing creative economy experts and success stories from around the world and around the corner. The summit, produced by Creative Cities Productions and the Michigan State Housing Development Authority's Cool Cities team, is a three-day event rooted in the creative economy movement and based at Detroit's Renaissance Center. Registration is $300 and can be completed online at creativecitiessummit.com.
“Most cities have something cool, interesting, creative going on, but it doesn't get the publicity it deserves,” said Peter Kageyama, a community economic development consultant and a partner with Creative Cities Productions. “It's like an island and it just needs to be connected with other islands. I kind of see my role as pushing all these little tiny flames together and all of a sudden you've got a little fire going. Part of my job is just to go in and reframe what's already going on.”
Kageyama produced the first Creative Cities Summit, which was held in St. Petersburg, Fla. in 2004. Karen Gagnon, director of MHSDA's Cool Cities team, presented there when the Cool Cities initiative was brand new, and she's since been on several panels with Kageyama around the world. He's heard her tell Detroit's story many times, but he didn't really get it until she invited him to see for himself about a year ago. She showed him the classic architecture of the Inn on Ferry Street, the enthusiasm of entrepreneurs like Web publisher Paul Schutt of Issue Media Group. He had lunch at the Motown Soul Food Café in the Fisher Building. And yes, he saw some struggling neighborhoods, but the city wasn't the urban wasteland he expected.
“I guess it was not so much the physical side as it was the attitude of the people I met who were so incredibly positive about Detroit. It made me go, 'Wow, there are some smart, smart people who are highly engaged in Detroit and certain it will come back in a great way.'
“Detroit is in many ways the epitome of the American industrial city. In many ways it reflects the American industrial economy. So many post-industrial cities are facing issues just like Detroit, but because Detroit was once so high — because it was once the Silicon Valley of the world — it's depths seem so much deeper.”
The Creative Cities Summit will take on themes like marketing a creative city, attracting and retaining talent, and building incubators for creative businesses — showcasing what's worked with discussion from some of the best-known consultants and authors in the creative economy world. The afternoon program on Oct. 14 features a panel discussion with some of the biggest names in this movement — Richard Florida, John Howkins and Charles Landry — the very people who coined the terms “creative class” “creative economy” and “creative city,” respectively. Each will deliver a keynote address during the week, but the panel discussion offers a rare opportunity to get into their collective, creative heads.
Ferrari, 36, is a longtime supporter of the Michigan Opera Theatre's BravoBravo event, and she's been particularly passionate about Detroit's creative economy since she joined the board of CreateDetroit, a nonprofit devoted to attracting creative professionals to Detroit, in 2003. But she's loved the city a lot longer than that. As a kid, the Troy native’s grandpa brought her to Detroit Tigers games almost weekly and took her to Sanders for sundaes. She says she never felt threatened, never bought into the negative stereotypes.
After studying environmental science at Oakland University, earning a law degree at Wayne State University, and practicing law for a few years, she and a partner identified a consulting niche and started a business, Redevelopment and Restoration Consultants L.L.C., which put together public incentive packages for redevelopment projects in Detroit.
“When I wanted to start a small business myself, I wasn't afraid to head into the city,” she said. “My partner and I started in a business incubator in 100 square feet. The office we moved out of when we sold the business was 3,500 square feet.”
In her role with the county executive's office she works to develop the kind of public policy that will support creatives — particularly those working with the film industry. She pulled together the Detroit Film Action Committee, a diverse group of regional leaders, to focus on the issues of filmmaking.
It's one of the small flames in the fire Kageyama hopes to stoke.
“Right now there are a lot of small efforts that are being pushed at various different levels — the New Economy Initiative, the Knight Foundation, Detroit Renaissance. What we really need is a master plan just to make sure we're covering all our bases,” Ferrari said. “We need to make sure people who are here now are working, that they can stay here, and that we're not having the negative effect of bringing more people in when there's not work for them.”
The Creative Cities Summit, Ferrari says, will not only give Detroiters a chance to commune with the experts, it'll bring thousands of creative-minded people to the city, where they can feel the energy for themselves.
“When I go into a grocery store or a restaurant or a bar, I see other people who I know are passionate about the city,” Ferrari said. “We all know the negatives, but being around people who are passionate about the city — that's where creative people want to be.”
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