GM Renaissance Center

The GM Renaissance Center has been likened to a fortress on the riverfront. Designed by John Portman and Associates for the Ford Motor Company and a consortium of 50 other companies, the complex of seven skyscrapers stands out in more ways than one. The glass-covered cylindrical hotel tower near the center of the complex reaches 73 stories, higher than any other building in Michigan. The first building in Phase I of the complex opened in 1976. The next year, the Renaissance Center was home to the tallest hotel in the world, a record that held until 1980 with Kansas City's Hyatt Regency Crown Center. Detroit's Marriott at the Renaissance Center was the 29th tallest hotel in 2021. The sixth and seventh buildings, Phase II (to the east of Phase I), were complete by 1981. The "RenCen" has its own zip code and includes the headquarters of General Motors, a Westin hotel, multiple shops and restaurants, and a Wintergarden atrium with views of the Detroit River and Windsor, Ontario.

Plans for the Renaissance Center were announced by Henry Ford II, the chairman of the Ford Motor Company, in November 1971. A contest was held to name the complex. Construction of Phase I began in May 1973, on what was then the largest privately-funded commercial construction project in the world. When the cylindrical hotel tower opened in 1977, it held the Detroit Plaza Hotel. Now the Detroit Marriott at the Renaissance Center, the 1,300-room hotel is the tallest hotel in the Western Hemisphere; it became the second tallest hotel in the world when a taller hotel opened in Singapore in 1986. Comedian Bob Hope entertained at the grand opening party for the hotel and four Phase I office towers (Towers 100 to 400) on April 15th, 1977.

The two towers in Phase II (Towers 500 and 600) were built by subsidiaries of Ford Motor Land Development Corporation and Rockefeller Center, Inc. Six years after Phase II opened, the city's elevated transit line (Detroit People Mover) became operational in 1987 with a stop at the Renaissance Center on the north side of Phase I. General Motors bought the Renaissance Center in May 1996 to become their global headquarters; by 2005, the corporation's renovations were complete, at a cost of $500 million. The Wintergarden, with a five-story-tall atrium, opened in December 2001; the glass-covered space was formerly occupied by a fitness center, parking garage, and pool. Concrete berms that formerly lined the Jefferson Avenue side of the complex were removed in 2004 to create a new front entrance. The RenCen, at over 5.5 million square feet of space, is one of the largest commercial complexes in the world. Phase III, designed as riverfront residences in eight more towers, was never built due to a decline in Detroit's population.

Photographs of the construction of the RenCen have been archived and digitized by Detroit's Wayne State University Library; a promotional video by the Detroit Historical Society, telling the story of how Phase I was being built and what this meant for Detroit, extolled the groundbreaking "city in a city" (both linked below). General Motors' continual auto show-like space in the complex, GM World, recently displayed all eight generations (1953 to 2020) of their classic sports car, the Corvette. Due to the pandemic, GM World closed to the public in 2020 and was still closed as of August 2021.

Shoppers at the RenCen can receive two hours of validated free parking; check out the link to directions and maps for more info. The complex offers 29 restaurants, too - some are in the multistory base beneath the four towers and hotel of Phase I, and some are in the central hotel tower, including a revolving top floor with views of the city through its floor-to-ceiling windows.

Detroit Historical Society. Renaissance Center, Encyclopedia of Detroit. January 1st 2021. Accessed August 3rd 2021. https://detroithistorical.org/learn/encyclopedia-of-detroit/renaissance-center.

General Motors. GM World Displays Eight Generations of Corvette, GM RENCEN blog. January 1st 2020. Accessed August 3rd 2021. https://gmrencen.com/gm-world-displays-eight-generations-of-corvette/.

General Motors. About GMRENCEN, GMRENCEN. March 1st 2021. Accessed August 3rd 2021. https://gmrencen.com/about-the-ren-cen/.

Runyan, Robin. Mondry, Aaron. Detroit's most iconic buildings, mapped, Detroit Curbed. November 4th 2019. Accessed August 3rd 2021. https://detroit.curbed.com/maps/most-iconic-greatest-buildings-detroit.