Design Core Detroit, a nonprofit that offers services to strengthen, grow and attract design businesses to Detroit, and AIA Detroit announced Advance Plumbing Heating and Supply Company and its design team D Met Studios have won a Commerce Design: Detroit award in its inaugural competition.

Commerce Design: Detroit recognizes 10 brick-and-mortar commercial projects, submitted jointly by the business owner and design team.

"The jurors for Commerce Design: Detroit chose businesses that celebrate the impact of commercial design in neighborhood businesses. Regardless of project size or budget, the winners exemplify everything we had hoped for when bringing this program to Detroit," said Olga Stella, executive director of Design Core Detroit, a joint initiative of the College for Creative Studies and Business Leaders for Michigan.

Commerce Design: Detroit aims to recognize the role of design in increasing competitiveness of local businesses, spur work by local designers and architects, and preserve the unique local identity of Detroit’s neighborhoods. These spaces help to create a sense of place, and improve quality of life for locals and visitors alike.

Commerce Design: Detroit is just one of more than 50 initiatives launched by Design Core and its Detroit City of Design partners as part of a larger strategy to champion inclusive growth. Through this program, Design Core and AIA Detroit are striving to develop a culture in Detroit neighborhoods that uses design to create spaces that welcome all.