Tamela Todd opened Sip 'N Read on August 27, 2025, at 1620 Michigan Avenue in Corktown. It is a bookstore. It is also a wine bar.
Customers have to be 21 or over to walk in. The space is 2,400 square feet inside The Corner mixed-use development at Michigan and Trumbull, the former site of Tiger Stadium and now home to a Detroit City FC field. Todd is a published author with three nonfiction books on mental health, a certified wine enthusiast, and the kind of person who sees a hole in the market and works on it for six years.
The seating area holds about 50 guests. The wine list is exclusively Michigan. Todd has said she made that choice on purpose, because Michigan wineries do not get the press they deserve.
The bar pours in five-ounce or eight-ounce glasses. Todd partnered with Chateau Chantal Winery in Traverse City to launch Library of Rosé, a private-label rosé available only at the shop. The food is light, mostly charcuterie.
There are also mocktails for people who came for the books. Todd started working on the concept in 2019, went through a TechTown Detroit program, then watched the pandemic stop the plan cold. She found the Corktown space in December 2021.
Total investment came to about $300,000. Of that, $65,000 was a Motor City Match cash grant. Invest Detroit and the Detroit Development Fund contributed additional capital.
The build-out involved Detroit-based Infuz Architects, a custom bar from Livonia-based Millis & Associates, and decor by Kori Fields of Colour By Numbr Designs. The store will host monthly events. A Silent Book Club day.
Memoirs and Mocktails. Sip and Sounds. There is a member wine club in development.
Local authors will eventually be able to get their books on the shelves. A few blocks from Michigan Central Station and a short walk from the new AlumniFi Field site, Sip 'N Read sits in the middle of Corktown's most active development corridor in decades. The neighborhood has not had a Black-owned business of this kind on Michigan Avenue in some time.
1620 Michigan Ave., Suite 122, Detroit
