“Ruins are the visible symbols and landmarks of our societies and theirchanges…the volatile result of the change of eras and the fall ofempires. This fragility leads us to watch them one very last time: tobe dismayed, or to admire, it makes us wonder about the permanence ofthings.”
At the beginning of the 20th Century, the city of Detroit developed rapidly thanks to the automobile industry.
Until the 50’s, its population rose to almost 2 million people. Detroit was the 4th most important city in the United States.
It was the dazzling symbol of the American Dream City with its monumental skyscrapers and fancy neighborhoods.
Increasing segregation and deindustrialization caused violent riots in 1967. The white middle-class exodus from the city accelerated and the suburbs grew. Firms and factories began to close or move to lower-wage states. Slowly, but inexorably downtown high-rise buildings emptied.
Since the 50’s, “Motor City” lost more than half of its population.
Nowadays, its splendid decaying monuments are, no less than the Pyramids of Egypt,
the Coliseum of Rome, or the Acropolis in Athens, remnants of the passing of a great civilization.