Famous people's places / Detroit – East Riverfront
Frederick Stearns Building
Closed – archive entry
Frederick K. Stearns's 1899 pharmaceutical factory on East Jefferson, a National Register landmark converted into 177 loft condominiums in 1989.
01 / The story of this place
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Frederick K. Stearns ran one of the country's leading pharmaceutical manufacturers from Detroit, and in the late 1890s he hired architect William B. Stratton to design a new production plant on East Jefferson Avenue, completed in 1899 for about eighty-five thousand dollars. Albert Kahn added an expansion in 1910. Stearns worked here until 1921, and the company he built stayed in business for decades afterward, eventually sold to the Sterling Drug Company in 1944. By the late twentieth century the factory had outlived its industrial use, and in 1989 developers converted the quarter-million-square-foot complex into the Lofts at Rivertown, 177 residential condominiums. The building earned a spot on the National Register of Historic Places in 1980 and became a Michigan State Historic Site the following year, and it still stands today as housing along the riverfront.
- Built in 1899 for Frederick K. Stearns's pharmaceutical company
- Albert Kahn designed a 1910 addition
- Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1980
- Converted into 177 loft condominiums in 1989
Famous Detroiters
Famous people tied to this place 1
Lexicon entries for the people who lived, worked, performed or liked to spend time here.
- Frederick K. Stearns 1854–1924 · pharmaceutical manufacturer, owner of the Detroit Wolverines, DSO founder
Worked here
The company plant he commissioned from William B. Stratton; a National Register site converted to condominiums in 1989.
Sources & fact check · Checked: 2026-09-25
An independently written bilingual guide. This collection is not an attendance-based ranking.
03 / Events
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