Community Events

Enjoy the early weeks of spring migration with the Detroit Bird Alliance and the Historic Elmwood Foundation! Learn about our historic cemetery and arboretum on a leisurely birding walk. This field trip is great for birders of all ages and experience levels. Bring your own binoculars or Detroit Bird Alliance will have some to borrow. We'll serve refreshments in our historic chapel following the walk. April 11 at 8:30 a.m. — register with the Detroit Bird Alliance. 

In April, we'll explore the cemetery's memorial art and architecture, highlighting works by Marshall Fredericks, Rudolph Evans and Randolph Rogers, and get to know some of the artists and architects buried here, from Gothic masters Albert Jordan and Gordon Lloyd to modern legends like Nathan Johnson and Gilda Snowden. Sunday, April 12 at 10 a.m. with tour guide Laurie Gonyea. This is a walking tour that will last about two hours. The tour is free, but please sign up here! 

Join us on April 25 for our inaugural Spring Day at Elmwood! Welcome the season and explore our beautiful Arboretum as it comes into bloom. We'll have nature-inspired crafts for all ages, mini-tours, and a cemetery scavenger hunt. Community partners including Detroit Bird Alliance and Planet Detroit will be on hand with even more fun seasonal activities. We invite you to bring a picnic to enjoy in community around the pond! Free and open to all from 12 to 4 p.m.

As part of the festivities we'll also offer a 90-minute tree tour with a certified arborist at 1 p.m. — capacity for the tree tour is limited, so please sign up if you plan to join! Otherwise, just bring yourself, your family and friends, and your spring fever! Questions? Want to be part of it as a sponsor or community partner? Email us: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. 

Bird through peak bloom (we hope!) with the Detroit Bird Alliance and the Historic Elmwood Foundation! Learn about our historic cemetery and arboretum on a leisurely birding walk. This field trip is great for birders of all ages and experience levels. Bring your own binoculars or Detroit Bird Alliance will have some to borrow. We'll serve refreshments in our historic chapel following the walk. May 9 at 8:30 a.m. — register with the Detroit Bird Alliance. 

Elmwood Cemetery has been integrated since its founding in 1846, making it one of the oldest integrated cemeteries in the Midwest and a rich site of Detroit’s Black heritage. Join Jamon Jordan, Official Historian for the City of Detroit, for a captivating walking tour as he shares stories from 200 years of Black history. From abolitionists William Lambert and George DeBaptiste to Mayor Coleman Young and Martha Jean “The Queen” Steinberg, we’ll visit notable Black leaders, luminaries, activists, entrepreneurs, artists and more who made Detroit the city it is today. It's May 23 at 11 a.m. This tour is free, but please sign up here!

Our office will be closed in observance of the Memorial Day holiday, but our gates will be open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. We welcome visitors to stop outside the office and take a carnation or a flag for your loved one's grave.