Fisher 21 Lofts Converts a 1919 Albert Kahn Body Plant Into 433 Apartments

Fisher Body Plant 21 has been Detroit’s most photographed ruin for thirty-three years. Albert Kahn designed it, it opened in 1919, it closed in 1993, and every year since it has been the building people point to when they want to make a case about the city one way or the other. It is now a $134 million conversion into 433 apartments.

Project Scope

The six-story plant becomes studios, one- and two-bedrooms and lofts, with 20% of the units affordable. The ground floor gets about 28,000 square feet of commercial space anchored by a grocery and public market, plus roughly 15,000 square feet of co-working, a pool, a fitness center, a rooftop terrace and a dog park.

Kappa Construction is the general contractor and McIntosh Poris Architects is the architect. The developer is Fisher Lofts Development Company, a partnership of Gregory Jackson’s Jackson Asset Management, Richard Hosey’s Hosey Development and Lewand Development. Sustainability scope includes high-efficiency glazing and envelope, water reclamation and a solar-ready roof structure, though no formal certification has been announced. The developer’s own materials now say units are available in 2027, a slip from earlier reporting that targeted substantial completion in late 2026.

Why It Matters

The Community Benefits Ordinance agreement contains a condition you do not see in adaptive reuse contracts. The developer has to preserve portions of the building’s graffiti. Thirty years of trespass art is now a heritage requirement with a contract behind it, which is a genuinely novel piece of preservation drafting and a real coordination problem for the trades working those elevations.

It is also reported as the largest African-American-led development project in Detroit’s history. Milwaukee Junction is where Detroit’s auto industry actually started, and Plant 21 is one of the last large Kahn structures in the district still standing. The alternative on the table for most of the last decade was demolition.

Project Team & Details