Caterpillar

Caterpillar started as a technical challenge: place eight apartments within one massive pre-engineered Quonset Hut while prioritizing natural light and abundant green space. Caterpillar invests the savings from the pre-engineered structure into eight accessibly-priced, museum-quality apartments surrounded by 150 trees. The result is an 8,000 SF, residential project with a generous public park for the neighborhood to enjoy that applies a poetic, yet rigid and disciplined approach toward the elements that truly matter— the quality of indoor and outdoor space and generous landscape.

Since 2012, Prince Concepts has acquired and owns seventeen acres of land, renovated 62,000 square feet of formerly blighted industrial property, imagined and built 20,000 SF of new housing, created 15,000 SF of thoughtful public space, planted over 300 trees, and won nine national and international awards for its completed projects.

The vast majority of this development has taken place, and will continue to be, in Core City. We believe that consistent, dedicated, and focused work within a specific area is how the unique character and value within the Detroit neighborhoods comes to life.

Core City is bounded by three award-winning Prince Concept projects, all walkable within five minutes: True North, a community of eight Quonset huts on 25,000 square feet of land; Caterpillar, a 9,000 square foot eight-unit Quonset hut nestled in a 180-tree public green space designed by award-winning architect Julie Bargmann of D.I.R.T studio; and Core City Park, also designed by Bargmann, a former parking lot transformed into an urban oasis with more than 100 trees across 8,000 square feet of land.

True North was the winner of some of the most significant Architecture prizes during the 2017/2018 award cycle, most notably serving as one of six finalists for the enlightened Mies Crown Hall America’s Prize. The project also received the 2017 Progressive Architecture Award from Architect Magazine and the Multi-Family Development of the Year, Best of Design Awards from The Architect's Newspaper.

In 2021, Caterpillar won C-IDEA’s Gold Award. The same year, both Caterpillar and 5K were named the winners of the Design of the Year Award from the Architecture MasterPrize in the categories of residential (multi-unit) and commercial architecture respectively.

Prince Concepts has also received recognition as the 2021 winner of the Developer—Midwest, Best of Practice Awards for The Architect’s Newspaper, and second place in Architecture, Most Innovative Companies from Fast Company.