Stanton Yards transforms an abandoned post-industrial waterfront site on the edge of the Detroit River into a new home for cultural and ecological activity, animated by new art institutions, rolling parkland, public art plazas, and habitat improvements. The 13-acre site—nearly the length of the High Line and formerly cut off from public access—adaptively reuses the landscapes, waterfront, and vacant structures that once housed a sprawling World War II boat production complex. The design reinvents the site as a series of “Yards,” or outdoor rooms that provide a diversity of public waterfront destinations.

Much like the rest of Detroit that has lost upwards of 93% of its shoreline habitat, the 13-acre site is currently paved throughout, and the waterfront is lined with steel sheet piling and hardened by concrete bulkheads. Central to the mission of the project is to reintroduce biodiversity and the experience of nature. The regional landscape morphology of glacial moraine informs a “dunescape” in which planted dunes rupture the ground plane. This guides pedestrians from the city to the waterfront, reintroduces substantial amounts of porous ground to capture and filter water, softens the shoreline to provide native riverine habitat, and brings shade and microclimate to visitors. The result is a landscape of discovery for the public, in which visitors of all ages can explore the river’s edge by foot or by kayak, animated with nursing logs, tidal pools, and bird perches that support the local ecosystem of otters, ospreys, bass, and walleye.

To honor and reveal the site’s industrial and cultural history while employing sustainable strategies, the project celebrates and reuses existing materials by repurposing existing paving, manufacturing equipment such as rails and tanks, and industrial buildings.

Where paved alleyways and acres of asphalt previously existed, the landscape is programmed to include plazas, parkland, beaches, barbeque areas, kayak zones, boat slips, outdoor sculpture galleries, and waterfront promenades. In this way, landscape programming supports proposed art institutions and hospitality interior programming, while drawing all ages of the nearby community to the waterfront. The mixed-use framework, including cultural, commercial, and hospitality-driven spaces, promotes adaptive reuse and evolution with community needs and future growth. Stanton Yards will become a hub for social, economic, and environmental impact, benefitting the Little Village neighborhood and the Detroit region, and reactivating a vital waterfront location for future generations.