Just after World War I, prosperous Detroiters wished to recruit Chopin scholar Ossip Gabilowitsch to direct the city's symphony. To come to Detroit, he wanted a new music hall so the building near Woodward and Mack was quickly built to attract him to the Motor City. It had been planned for Detroit's Cultural Center.

I have heard that after Ossip Gabilowitsch and his wife, Clara Clemens, moved to Detroit they lived in the Herman Strasbourg residence that Marcus Burrowes had designed about 1914. Is that true? Was occupancy of the Strasbourg residence part of the signing package? Thanks.