West Vernor/Lawndale Historic District

The West Vernor/Lawndale Historic District stands at the west end of what was the Baker Street streetcar line and at the locally important intersection with Lawndale Avenue, which provides the most direct connection between West Vernor and another key Detroit highway, Fort Street. The district's development during the 1920s reflects the construction of the huge Ford Motor Company River Rouge complex located just one mile to the west of the district. The building of the Ford River Rouge plant led to the rapid urbanization of this southwest Detroit neighborhood in the 1920s. The district is notable for its many excellent representative examples of the commercial and apartment building architecture of the 1920s, including three-story buildings that reflect the more intensive land uses along this western part of West Vernor near the Rouge than along the older stretches to the east.

The West Vernor/Lawndale District is comprised of ten buildings in a two block area on West Vernor at the intersection with Lawndale. The district is defined by Cabot on the west and Ferris on the east on the south side of West Vernor and includes that portion of the north side of West Vernor that lies between Cabot and the northeast corner of Lawndale. With the exception of two adjacent parcels of vacant land on the north side of West Vernor, the street is intact with two and three-story buildings that represent a time period in the development of West Vernor Highway later than the West Vernor/Junction and West Vernor/Springwells districts. The district contains a concentration of apartment and commercial/apartment buildings, plus a Neoclassical bank building and a lodge hall dating primarily from the late 1910s and 1920s. The neighborhood commercial area reflects the development of the Ford River Rouge factory complex in the late 1910s, which spurred rapid residential development of the area, and the construction of Vernor, completed in 1925, that made Vernor a major traffic artery.