Pleasant Ridge

Pleasant Ridge is barely half a square mile — one of the smallest cities in all of Michigan, and the very smallest when it incorporated back in 1927. It’s named for a literal ridge: an ancient, elevated beach line left behind by the Great Lakes that early travelers found easy to walk, which became Ridge Road, which became the spine of a town. A farmer turned the old Mayday farm into building lots in 1913, ten families settled in along the ridge, and a tiny, tidy community took root.

What makes it special is the houses. The Pleasant Ridge Historic District, on the National Register of Historic Places, is a storybook collection of homes built between 1910 and 1930 — Tudors, Dutch Colonials, English cottages, Spanish and French revivals — and the charm is that no two are alike. As one architectural historian put it, you might pass a Greek Revival, a Queen Anne, an English cottage, and an Italianate all on a single block. (Keep an eye out for the 1927 “Gingerbread House,” a storybook Tudor locals adore.) Add a famously civic, roll-up-your-sleeves community spirit, one of the most welcoming and inclusive populations in the state, and the Detroit Zoo sitting right across I-696, and you’ve got a pocket-sized gem that punches way above its size.

Pleasant Ridge was built by accomplished professionals rather than celebrities — and a few stand out. Louis H. Fead went on to become Chief Justice of the Michigan Supreme Court, and Dr. Myra Babcock led anesthesiology at Detroit’s Grace Hospital at a time when very few women ran a hospital department. But the truest “notable locals” here are the residents themselves: a small, fiercely engaged community whose historical commission, garden club, and annual June home tour keep this little place as lovely as the day it was built.