We're delighted to share a new article about the El Moore Lodge published this week in MLive! "It's big-city living and a small town escape inside the Moonbeam Cabin, one of the four cabin rooms at the El Moore Lodge in Detroit's Cass Corridor neighborhood," begins Ian Thibodeau's article, a thorough and thoughtful treatment of our triple bottom line business. Read the whole thing here. … [Read more...]
Archives for February 2016
Ralph Rinaldi remembers a Cass Corridor in full dimensions – Part 1
February 22, 2016 By
If you closed your eyes and listened to Ralph Rinaldi reminisce about the Cass Corridor that surrounds the El Moore, the way it used to be before Midtown was barely an idea, you would see it at first, then you would hear it and smell it. Then suddenly you’re there, looking around at a very different place in time. It is a countercultural neighborhood, but also exceptionally tolerant. A diverse neighborhood of artists, students and professors as well as junkies, pimps and prostitutes. But there was room for them all, and somehow they made it work… Because that's what neighborhoods do. An Education for the People “I used to go there in the mid '60s and everything was rip snorting around then. The anti war movement was the most popular thing going around, if you wanna call it … [Read more...]
A.C. Varney and the Varney Room
February 18, 2016 By
I must say they have done quite well with the old girl. Quite well indeed. And I must also say that I am not one who tends to be easily impressed. I did not make my name by being accommodating to mediocrity, and I simply will not tolerate its presence. There is no excuse for it. When I designed the El Moore over a century ago (for the sake of time we will skip the admittedly remarkable details of how I came to be a guest in my cherished building so long after my death, but believe me, this is a story you will want to hear at a later date), my desire was to create a luxury accommodation for only the finest of Detroit’s residents in one of the city’s most fashionable areas. I recall the neighborhood surrounding the El Moore as a wonderfully busy thoroughfare, a perfect residential … [Read more...]
The El Moore Residents Meet the El Moore Lodge Guests
February 11, 2016 By
The El Moore, a fully and sustainably restored 1898 residential complex located at 624 W. Alexandrine in Midtown Detroit, includes a unique mixture of long-term leased apartments and short-term accommodations for guests to our wonderful city. Whether you plan to visit Detroit for one night or a couple of weeks, the El Moore Lodge offers you a place to call home that is so much more the usual corporate hotel room. The El Moore Lodge gives you several choices beautifully appointed rooms that integrate the 19th-century past with the 21-century present: the Rooftop Urban Cabins on the top of the El Moore with a breathtaking view of the cityscape, the Parkview Rooms on the 1st floor right next to the El Moore Parlor, the budget-conscious Gardenview Shared Rooms that harken back to the … [Read more...]
The Surprisingly Complex World of Mattresses
February 8, 2016 By
If you're going to develop a green lodge, one of the fundamental decisions you'll make will be what sort of mattress to select. As we delved into our research, we were frankly surprised at the number of issues surrounding mattresses, from chemical additives to disposal and recycling. Even with the so-called green mattresses, 'green' was a relative term. In the end, we found a great mattress that checked off all our boxes, but only after exhaustive research. Let me briefly summarize for you some of our findings, and finish with the mattress we selected, and why. One of the major issues with standard mattresses is their toxicity. From Mother Jones magazine (2008): Since the mid- to late '60s, most mattresses have been made of polyurethane foam, a petroleum-based material that emits … [Read more...]