Marketplace

Dan Kolander Is Back in Town

Husband-and-wife team Dan and Sarah Kolander—longtime owners of Dan’s Downtown Tavern in Saline—purchased Chelsea Burger, in the space formerly occupied by Seitz’s Tavern. In an interview before a planned late-September opening, Dan Kolander says they’ll serve a “simple, easy menu” of burgers, sandwiches, wraps, and weekly specials—and they’ve applied for a liquor license.

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Arise Bakery and Cafe in Saline

Andrea Cocciolone and Rose Richards, decades-long friends with a common interest in adventure racing—running, biking, and kayaking—are nearly a year into their latest adventure, Arise Bakery and Cafe. 

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A Framing Phoenix in Saline

Framing artwork and memorabilia “doesn’t look hard, but it takes many years to really hone in and get a nice precision, quality craftsmanship,” says Matthew Findling, owner of Phoenix Custom Framing & Gallery. A thirty-year industry veteran, he opened in June in the tin-ceilinged former Rock Paper Scissors storefront on W. Michigan Ave. It’s “a beautiful space,” he says. “I fell in love with it pretty much right off the bat.”

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Case Kittel & Hayley Billingsley

Case Kittel and his brother, Ross, were in the middle of the Au Sable River when Ross turned thirty-two. It was midnight and they were competing in the 2023 AuSable Canoe Marathon, a grueling, 120-mile canoe race that starts in Grayling and ends the next day in Oscoda. At midnight, Case says, he started singing “Happy Birthday.” There was another canoe near them; the folks in that boat “were like, ‘What?!,’” but they joined in the singing, too.

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Detroit-Style Pizza on W. Michigan Ave.

An expert in Detroit-style pizza and a veteran restaurateur are collaborating on a full-service and takeout business they expect to appeal to both Saline locals and destination diners. Joe Maino and Jason Branham’s DropTop Pizza includes a vivid dining room and bar along Saline’s main drag, with a back entrance for takeout orders and grab-and-go food and drinks.

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Home Is Where the Heart Is

Early one morning two years ago, Gail Kuhnlein left her beloved home in Pittsfield Township’s Hidden Creek subdivision for heart surgery and almost didn’t return. Kuhnlein, now sixty, suffered complications during the scheduled repair of a congenital defect in her mitral valve, and was in a medically induced coma for weeks before she recovered. When she returned two months later to the home she shares with her husband, Tim, it was with a new perspective on life. “This,” she says, “is all bonus time.”  

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Pulse Nutrition in Dexter

Lynnea Harris spent three years playing professional volleyball overseas. “My job in Italy was to perform or I didn’t get paid,” she says. “I was drinking like one or two [protein] shakes a day. I was in the best shape of my entire life.” 

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Chelsea Home Replaces Whitetail

Whitetail, Mary Baude’s design, home, and lifestyle shop on S. Main, closed in April. She’d launched her business in Dexter in 2016, and moved it to Chelsea in 2022; in March 2024, she announced her retirement on Instagram. Chelsea Home, interior designer Kitty Golding’s boutique, is set to open by November 8 in Whitetail’s former space.

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Pretty in Pink

“This whole store is me,” beams Amanda Debek from a deep U-shaped booth upholstered in pink velvet and topped with a rich arrangement of artificial flowers at her new House of Chimney Cakes Café.

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University Flower Shop Branches Out

University Flower Shop has expanded from Nickels Arcade to the west side with a second, much larger production and sales site. The 4,000-square-foot facility on S. Wagner Rd. provides ample space for creating custom floral arrangements and planning events, as well as free, on-site parking for drop-in or pickup customers.

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The Last Holdouts

In the end, even Julie Welch accepted the inevitable. Back in June 2023, she defiantly told MLive that she hoped never to sell 730 S. Division St., a 1,064-square-foot Cape Cod built in 1901. Her parents bought it in 1962 as a student rental, and she said, as far as she was concerned, “Build around me, and let’s coexist in peace.” 

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Pink Puzzle

What do a British telephone booth, pillar post box, park bench, and two signposts with Chinese and English flags behind the Hot Pot Chen restaurant have in common? Does the Chinese signage on the shipping container behind the objects hold a clue? And why is everything pink? 

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Plates of Joyy Opens at Briarwood

Twenty-one-year-old culinary artist Leslie Tejada has come a long way from the Dominican Republic, where she spent her first ten years. Briarwood Mall was impressed enough with her cupcakes—and her Instagram presence—to lease her space for The Plates of Joyy, which opened September 20.

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Explosion Aftermath

Shortly after 6 a.m. on Feb. 19, residents of the West Side were jolted awake by the sound of an explosion, followed by the wail of fire and police sirens. A small house at 701 S. Seventh St. had blown up.

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