The aptly named Makeshift Gallery will punctuate its three-year run with an open house party on December 28, its last day at 407 E. Liberty.
“It’s a happy closing,” says Jim Moran, one of the coordinators of the artist-run consignment gallery. “We’ve been on basically a day-to-day lease for three years, and the owners have worked with us really, really well to help keep us there, but now a restaurant is coming in that is paying actual rent, as opposed to what they allowed us to pay.”
Related: Makeshift Gallery: The artists’ pop-up Catch Us While You Can returns.
The incoming tenant, unannounced as of yet, was kind enough to let them stay through the holiday shopping season, he says.
Now bigger things are on the horizon—or actually, down the nearby alley that connects E. Liberty with E. Washington. Moran says they’re part of a larger effort to activate the Liberty Square building into an arts and entertainment complex. The space was originally known as Tally Hall, built in 1986 as a food and retail mall, which soon failed, topped by a parking deck, which remains.
Makeshift will morph into the Alley Gallery, using both outdoor and increased indoor space to add to its current roster of about thirty main exhibitors and expand its programming. “We’re excited,” he says. “We can finally plan things!”
Liquidation sales were well under way at Value City Furniture in mid-December, laying bare the vastness of the 70,000-square-foot showroom at 425 E. Eisenhower.
Staff weren’t aware of a closing date, and no one was available to comment on the record. “We technically don’t have a store manager right now,” according to one harried sales associate. Discounts of 50 to 75 percent drew plenty of customer traffic.
Columbus-based parent company American Signature Inc. filed for bankruptcy protection November 22, planning to close thirty-three (including seven in Michigan) of its 120 stores while pursuing a purchaser for its remaining assets.
The Ann Arbor store had been in operation since 2021, succeeding the bankrupt Loves Furniture & Mattresses, which only months earlier had scooped up twenty-seven Art Van Furniture stores.
Related: Art Van Is Now Loves
The now-defunct, Michigan-based Art Van opened the building in 1993. Founder Archie Van Elslander’s trust sold it in 2017 for $13.6 million in a sale-leaseback arrangement that later became part of a larger lawsuit a bankruptcy trustee filed against his heirs. The case was settled in 2023 for $8 million.
Located within a TC1 zoning district (a transit corridor allowing for buildings up to 300 feet tall), the building on 4.5 acres is now listed for sale or lease.
The last remaining Baskin-Robbins ice cream parlor in Washtenaw County has closed. Robert Park, owner of the West Stadium Shopping Center location since 2016, did not renew his franchise agreement.
Faced with an upcoming corporate requirement to undertake an expensive remodeling project, he had listed the business for sale but found no takers. While B-R’s website still showed it as temporarily closed at press time, Park says he’s unaware of any successor franchisee.
Founded in 1945, Baskin-Robbins was purchased in 2020 by Inspire Brands, which also includes Arby’s, Buffalo Wild Wings, Dunkin’, Jimmy John’s, and Sonic Drive-In.
The shop at 1952 W. Stadium opened February 20, 1964, according to its grand opening ad in that day’s Ann Arbor News, which introduced it as the company’s 215th store. A single scoop of any of the thirty-one flavors went for six cents then.
The campus area bar and restaurant Blue Leprechaun closed December 13, seventeen years after it replaced Touchdown Cafe at 1220 South University. Neither the proprietor, Perry Porikos, nor the multiunit building’s ownership could immediately be reached for comment. Porikos also owns the ninety-year-old Brown Jug down the block, and all indications are it’s staying put, even as high-rise construction will soon begin between the two establishments at the site of Galleria Mall.
Got a retail or restaurant change? Email [email protected].