Rescued relics, restored grandeur: Detroit’s Michigan Central Station lives again after six-year renovation

Article contentThey reopened a stone quarry, crisscrossed America sleuthing for lost relics, and recovered a stolen artifact in a clandestine exchange with the thief. We apologize, but this video has failed to load.Try refreshing your browser, ortap here to see other videos from our team.We apologize, but this video has failed to load.Try refreshing your browser, ortap here to see other videos from our team.Ford Motor Company will reveal the revived 111-year-old Michigan Central Station to the public on Friday, following an epic six-year renovation nearly as historic as the iconic building itself. “The goal for us is to continue to expand the amount of public access because we want Michigan Central to be a very public asset and civic treasure,” Michigan Central CEO Josh Sirefman told the Windsor Star. Article content“It will be a real vibrant mix of experiences and activities happening in there.” Festivities began Thursday night with a concert produced by Eminem in front of what is now known as The Station, featuring Detroiters Jack White, Diana Ross, Big Sean, and the Detroit Symphony Orchestra. A free 10-day public open house begins Friday, though it’s all booked. Sirefman said additional tours are planned Fridays and Saturdays through the rest of the summer. The newly renovated Michigan Central Station is shown on Tuesday, June 4, 2024. Ford Motor Company, which spent $950 million to renovate the building and other properties, launched it with a concert produced by Eminem on Thursday night, June 6, 2024. TREVOR WILHELM/Windsor Star Photo by Trevor Wilhelm /Windsor Star The former Michigan Central Station, which sat empty for 30 years, is shown in this undated photo before Ford began its extensive renovation. Photo by Jacob Korenblum /Special to the National PostFord will occupy three floors in the station’s tower. Youth programs including a boys and girls club and Google’s Code Next Detroit will also take up residence in the tower. The building’s top few floors, destined to become a hotel, are still a work in progress while the company awaits zoning approvals. The ground floor will eventually offer restaurants, retail, and artistic and cultural events. “The ground floor, we’re going to take our time,” said Sirefman. “This is an amazing building and it’s complicated. We want to get it right.” The 18-storey station first opened in 1913 to accommodate the growing Michigan Central Railroad, a subsidiary of the New York Central Railroad owned by tycoon William Vanderbilt. The new building replaced the original train depot that closed after a major fire. Article contentArchitects Warren & Wetmore and Reed & Stem originally designed both Michigan Central and New York’s Grand Central Station. The Michigan terminal, with its Renaissance and Imperial Roman detailing, was named to the U.S. National Register of Historic Places in 1975. At its peak, 4,000 passengers went through Michigan Central every day. But in a twist of irony, the station that eventually came to symbolize the decline of the city that put the world on wheels fell victim to the growing prevalence of the automobile. Michigan Central closed after the last train, No. 353, departed for Chicago at 11:30 a.m. on Jan. 5, 1988. Thirty years of decay, neglect, and vandalism followed. The interior of Detroit’s Michigan Central Station is shown on Nov. 2. 2018, before Ford Motor Company began renovations. Photo by Trevor Wilhelm /Windsor Star The South Concourse of the freshly renovated Michigan Central Station provides a grand welcome to visitors on Tuesday, June 4, 2024. Photo by Trevor Wilhelm /Windsor StarA developer purchased the terminal in 1989 with short-lived plans for a casino, nightclub and hotel. Ambassador Bridge owner Matty Moroun bought it in 1995 and put up a razor-wire fence. The decay continued for two more decades, until June 11, 2018. Ford bought the abandoned train station for $90 million with plans to make it the heart of a 30-acre technology and cultural hub in Corktown. The company spent $950 million on the project, including renovations at the nearby Albert Kahn-designed Book Depository which launched last year, construction of an eight-acre park, and other projects. Article contentAbout 1.7 million hours of meticulous work has gone into restoring The Station. And just as it once exemplified Detroit’s hard times, battles with crime, and an historic 2013 bankruptcy, The Station now stands as a beacon to the city’s meteoric rebirth. An original Guastavino vaulted ceiling tile, one of the many artifacts on display at Detroit’s newly renovated Michigan Central Station, is shown on Tuesday, June 4, 2024. Photo by Trevor Wilhelm /Windsor Star Several artifacts discovered inside Michigan Central Station during cleanup and renovations, including antique shoes and a baseball are pictured Tuesday, June 4, 2024, are now on display at the newly renovated station. Photo by Trevor Wilhelm /Windsor StarFord was determined to ensure the newly restored building, once a mecca for ruin porn tourists, tells the whole story of the Motor City. Large sections of graffiti, splashed on the walls while the building sat abandoned and crumbling, still meet visitors at one of the entrances. A former employee hallway has been restored. But its rusty stairwell, which the public can see but not touch, has been left as it was found when Ford took over. A small section of wall tile beneath it was also left untouched, grimy and graffitied, to give visitors a before-and-after glimpse. But virtually everywhere else, the historic Beaux-Arts building is stunningly restored. “Incredible amount of research,” said Sirefman. “We have most of the original plans. A couple pages were missing. In a lot of cases, though, we had to do research to find historic photos to recreate things.” Article content A section of graffiti that was left if intact when Ford Motor Company renovated Michigan Central Station, as a way of representing all of the building’s history, is shown on Tuesday, June 4, 2024. Photo by Trevor Wilhelm /Windsor Star An original stone column on display outside the newly renovated Michigan Central Station is shown on Tuesday, June 4, 2024. Photo by Trevor Wilhelm /Windsor StarTeams at Ford used 3D printing and advanced modelling to recreate florets forming semicircle frames around windows in the Grand Hall. “Less than two percent of the original was still intact,” said Sirefman. “So going from there they figured out how to recreate 20-something different patterns.” Workers restored ornate interiors and the majestic Grand Hall with its vaulted 54-foot Guastavino tile ceiling. There are 29,000 Guastavino tiles in the massive Waiting Room and Grand Hall — all but 1,300 are original to the station — with the equivalent of about 14 kilometres of grout. They also rehabbed the building’s classical facade. To source more than 600 tons of limestone, Ford and its partners tracked down the same quarry in Indiana that provided the original stone for the building’s exterior 111 years ago. Like The Station, the quarry had also been closed for 30 years. So, they reopened it. “In other cases it’s the amazing team that worked on restoration, doing research, and tracking down objects,” said Sirefman. “There’s a piece, for example, that somebody had in Maine that the team went and 3D scanned so they could make moulds and recreate it.” Article content The skeleton of Michigan Central Station’s famous carriage house clock, which was missing for decades, is shown on display at the renovated building on Tuesday, June 4, 2024. Photo by Trevor Wihelm /Windsor Star A recreation of Michigan Central Station’s famous ticket lobby clock, built using 3D printing and scanning a recovered piece of the original artifact, is shown on Tuesday, June 4, 2024. Photo by Travor Wilhelm /Windsor StarThen there’s the story of the fabled carriage house clock, among hundreds of antique items stolen from the building over the decades. Shortly after Ford bought the station in 2018, the person who stole the clock reached out, offering to return it. The thief wrapped the treasured artifact in a moving blanket, left it leaning against the remains of a burned-out building a couple miles from the train station, and sent a message telling Ford where to find it. The clock fragment, currently on display on The Station’s first floor, will eventually be restored and returned to the carriage house. “Somebody did notify the team anonymously that they had this item, they were going to leave it in a certain location in the middle of the night and it could be picked up,” said Sirefman. “It was a substantial fragment of the original clock that had been over the carriage house.” Recommended from Editorial Ford buys iconic Michigan Central Station building Windsor stop part of proposed Toronto-Chicago passenger train route Sirefman said it appears the unknown thief took the clock to preserve it — a testament to how beloved Michigan Central is. It was not a unique situation. Article content“There are a lot of stories of people who acquired items from the station and held them to protect them and keep them for one day when maybe the station was restored,” he said. That passion only intensified as work progressed and new life coursed through the building. “It’s incredibly gratifying” said Sirefman. “The response has been tremendous. It manifests in every way. The outreach we get, the interest in partnerships we get. This was all true even before we reached this milestone for the station. We’ve just found everybody so excited and willing to collaborate and be a part of it.” Recreated ram’s heads adorning the walls of the Men’s Reading Room in the newly renovated Michigan Central Station are shown on Tuesday, June 4, 2024. The originals were all missing, so Ford Motor Company recreated the decorations by using old photographs and tracking down a private collector who leant them a missing piece to 3D print a new prototype. Photo by Trevor Wilhelm /Windsor Star Intricate details are found throughout the newly rejuvenated Michigan Central Station, as shown on Tuesday, June 4, 2024. Photo by Trevor Wilhelm /Windsor Star A restored former back of house employee hallway, with the original stairs and sections of old wall tile left untouched to highlight the transformation, is shown at the newly renovated Michigan Central Station on Tuesday, June 4, 2024. Photo by Trevor Wilhelm /Windsor Star The newly renovated Michigan Central Station — now known as simply The Station — has been restored to its former glory, as seen on Tuesday, June 4, 2024. Photo by Trevor Wilhelm /Windsor Star The newly renovated Michigan Central Station includes information about the historic building and its renovation, as seen on Tuesday, June 4, 2024. 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