It’s amazing to look back and take in just how much the deconstruction project on Dubois Street in Poletown East has connected so many parts of my life and the people I interact with the most today. In fact, my experiences with this project served as the foundation and inspiration for my impact project with Architectural Salvage Warehouse of Detroit where I am helping them increase their marketing presence and overall promotion of deconstruction. Looking back though, ASWD is only one organization that has been touched by and have touched this project. Here’s how they all connect:

Lawrence Tech: My alma mater. This project that is now going on over two years started at school as an extracurricular graduate research project.

RecoveryPark:  The non profit we originally partnered with who would have ownership to homes that we could deconstruct. Ultimately RecoveryPark is why I selected the house I did where I did. I have continued to work with them over the years and we even worked with them during our 6th challenge for Challenge Detroit this year.

Challenge Detroit: My first job out of college. I’ve gleaned a lot from this organization and ironically, since I set up the deconstruction of the house as a volunteer activity, many of the year 3 fellows came by to help deconstruct because they had done a challenge with RecoveryPark during their year and wanted to continue giving back to the community. Now, during Challenge Detroit year 4 the house is under construction not deconstruction and many of my year 4 friends have been out to help build the project. Dubois has become deep rooted in the Challenge Detroit organization. The project even became my focus point for my Challenge Detroit application video. We also even held an immersion activity at the project after the RecoveryPark challenge.

Sigma Phi Epsilon: My fraternity. As a result of this project, I am a fellow twice over. A Challenge Detroit fellow and a Sigma Phi Epsilon fellow. I earned this distinction by proposing the Dubois deconstruction for the Sigma Phi Epsilon Fellow award which is a program that awards large scale, 500+ hour community development projects. I am the first fellow to be named from my chapter.

Architectural Salvage Warehouse of Detroit (ASWD): My contractors. ASWD, along with Reclaim Detroit, is the main reclaimed material specialist in the city. They are a non-profit who deconstruct houses, builds reclaimed wood furniture, and does general contracting and renovations of historic buildings around the city. We engaged ASWD to consult for us on our deconstruction project and I have maintained a relationship with them to this day. In fact, they are the organization I chose to work with for my personal impact project to close out the Challenge Detroit year. I am working on increasing their marketing capacity and promoting deconstruction throughout the city.

I can’t thank all of these people and organizations enough for their contribution to the project that has meant so much to me and the community. My goal is to make it like nothing else in the city and let it be an example for how we can transform blight in this city. As this Challenge Detroit year comes to a close it is very humbling to know how each of these organizations has touched me and the project and how the project has touched them.