Where to Stay in Southfield, Michigan

What is Southfield known for?

Offices, not sights, built Southfield's reputation. The city ranks among the main commercial and business centres of Metro Detroit, which fills its roads on weekday mornings and empties them again by the evening, and that rhythm shapes a visit here more than any landmark does. Lathrup Village is the local curiosity.

Another city sits inside this one's boundary and keeps its own name. Congregations add the rest of the character, with St. John Armenian Church and Our Lady of Chaldeans Cathedral serving communities across this corner of Oakland County.

What are the main landmarks in Southfield?

Places of worship carry most of what Southfield keeps. St. John Armenian Church serves the Armenian community, while Our Lady of Chaldeans Cathedral does the same for Chaldean families across this part of Oakland County, and the two together account for the city's most recognisable buildings. John Grace School joins the named sites.

Plumbrooke Estates records a stretch of the residential city, one of the named sites that sit well away from the churches. Oak Park Ice Arena covers the sporting side.

What is the history of Southfield?

The founding year here is 1823, which puts Southfield among the older settlements of Oakland County and well ahead of the metropolitan region that eventually absorbed it. For most of that span it was farmland and scattered houses rather than a city. Detroit changed the arithmetic.

As the built-up area spread outward from the river, this ground turned into an inner-ring suburb, and offices followed the houses until Southfield counted as one of the commercial centres of Metro Detroit rather than a bedroom community. Lathrup Village is the odd survival of that growth. It stayed a separate city while Southfield expanded around every side of it, and the result is an enclave city sitting inside another city's boundary.

Communities left their own marks through the same decades. St. John Armenian Church and Our Lady of Chaldeans Cathedral were raised by congregations that settled here, John Grace School served the growing suburb, and Plumbrooke Estates belongs to the residential building that filled the rest of the 68 square kilometres. Fifteen miles now separate Southfield from downtown Detroit, and the ground between them has long since closed up.

Where is Southfield?

Southfield covers 68 square kilometres, generous for an inner-ring suburb, and the boundary takes an unusual shape because Lathrup Village occupies a block of ground in the middle of it without belonging to it. Built-up land runs to every edge. Neighbouring suburbs of Oakland County meet the city line directly, and downtown Detroit stands 15 miles away across the same continuous sprawl of Metro Detroit.

No open country breaks it.

What is the climate of Southfield?

Temperate seasons govern the year across Metro Detroit, and Southfield gets the full range of them: heat and humidity through the middle of summer, hard cold and snow once winter settles in, with the milder weeks falling either side. Office traffic hardly notices. Visitors do, because the walk between a hotel and a meeting is pleasant for only part of the year and the rest of it belongs firmly to the car.

Spring runs short here.

How do you get to Southfield?

Roads do nearly all the work. Fifteen miles of highway link downtown Detroit with Southfield, and the same routes carry the daily commute in from the rest of Oakland County, so arrival times are worth planning around the weekday peaks. Traffic thickens at both ends of the working day.

Lathrup Village and the neighbouring suburbs are minutes away by car.