City Modern, the eight-acre, 450-residence neighborhood Bedrock built in Brush Park, was officially declared complete on July 24, 2025. Dan Gilbert called it the first major ground-up neighborhood built in Detroit since the 1980s. He said so himself at the ribbon-cutting.
Mayor Mike Duggan was there too, talking about the city adding 7,000 residents a year and needing 3,500 housing units a year to keep up. Bedrock broke ground in 2015. Eight acres of mostly empty lots between John R Street, Edmund Place, and Beaubien Street, just north of the Central Business District and across from Little Caesars Arena.
When work started, more than 80 percent of Brush Park's lots were empty. The Gilded Age mansions had been demolished or left to collapse for decades. The plan: 20 new buildings designed by six different architecture firms (Hamilton Anderson Associates, Merge Architects, Lorcan O'Herlihy Architects, Studio Dwell, McIntosh Poris Architects, and Christian Hurttienne), plus the rehabilitation of three Victorian-era mansions into five luxury condominiums.
Total cost: roughly $100 million. The residence mix runs across price points. The Residences at City Modern offer 286 rental apartments across eight buildings.
The Flats, opened in 2019 at 124 Alfred Street and designed by Hamilton Anderson, has 54 affordable units reserved for residents 55 and older. Hunter Pasteur built the 53 Carriage Homes, duplex-style residences off shared courtyards designed by Merge, and the 52 for-sale Townhomes designed by Studio Dwell. The three rehabilitated mansions, basically four walls and a roof when Bedrock got hold of them, became five high-end condos.
Retail at street level totals 31,000 square feet and includes Brush Park Bodega, Brushery dental, and Lena, a Spanish wood-fired restaurant. The final two buildings finished last. The Residences at 2853 Brush Street completed in October 2024.
The Residences at 290 Edmund Place opened in April 2025. Both began renting this year. Mona Ross Gardner, who grew up in Brush Park in the 1950s and chaired the development's community advisory committee, said the neighborhood she remembered had been split apart and dilapidated.
Gardner sat on the selection panel that picked Bedrock from a competitive RFP. A walkable mews threads through the project. Brush Park has another dozen developments under construction or recently completed nearby.
City Modern was the catalyst.
124 Alfred St. (Flats) / 2660 John R St. (Residences), Detroit
