Downtown's New Buildings

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Luckenbach recommended Marc Rueter, “a very thoughtful and good designer.” Quinn pointed out that without the opinions of Roy Strickland, the context-minded director of the U-M’s program in urban design, and Bob Beckley, the sharp-tongued just-retired dean of the College of Architecture and Urban Planning, readers would lack the views of academic architects.

We asked them to evaluate the major buildings that have gone up downtown in the last five years. Collectively they described the good, the ugly, and the hideous of Ann Arbor’s ongoing building boom.

Nobody likes Corner House

Carl Luckenbach calls Corner House Apartments “everybody’s favorite whipping boy.” Opened in 2004 to the disdain of architects and the delight of State Street area merchants, the building has seven upper floors fully occupied by 180 mostly student residents, while its retail street level is booming with the Buffalo Wild Wings sports bar.