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Cosm is adding to downtown Detroit’s drive to be an entertainment-hospitality destination district.

The Inglewood, Calif.-based “shared reality” company will open its fourth immersive experience dome in the heart of downtown Detroit next year or in early 2027.

Think of it as a planetarium-like environment taken up a few notches. In fact, Cosm is the largest purveyor in the world of planetarium programming.

Ground was broken last month on the facility, on a windswept Monroe Street, the former home of a theatre and a couple of other buildings demolished in recent years. Bedrock Detroit, the city’s preeminent downtown developer, which revitalized scores of century-old vacant buildings into offices and homes, has sought to fill in the two blocks with a couple of previous proposals, in part victims of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The site has also been used for temporary exhibitions and the “Monroe Street Midway,” offering summer entrainment and fun sports. It also played a major role in last year’s NFL Draft, which drew tens of thousands. It is just off the city’s main street, Woodward Avenue and centerpiece downtown Campus Martius Park.

The first was a 35-storey office with almost 500 housing units. Then there was a 2,000-seat concert venue but Bedrock withdrew it as it would interfere with the nearby expansion of the venerable century-old Music Hall.

Cosm, which has facilities in Los Angeles, Dallas and soon Atlanta, is a transformative technology providing spectators with a simulation of live sporting or entertainment — as if you are actually there and partially surrounded by it.

“More than offering fans a front row seat to live sports and entertainment events taking place across the globe, the Cosm experience bridges the virtual and physical worlds by merging state-of-the-art visuals with the energy of the crowd,” the company says in a release.

There’s also food and drink available to complete the stadium-like experience. Cosm and Bedrock didn’t make officials available for an interview.

Technically, Cosm will offer an 87 foot dome within the 70,000-square-foot building. But it will be just one of a two-phase development, the other being a large residential complex on the block next door. No cost estimates have been released but Bedrock reportedly was part of a group that raised $250 million for Cosm.

There will be seating for 700 but facilities include a lounge, outdoor deck and adjoining food market hall featuring local eateries which will bring total capacity to 1,500. That 34,000-square-foot hall is being developed by London, U.K.-based The Venue Group.

Locally-based Rossetti is the architect.

Meanwhile, at an appropriate time, construction will begin on phase two featuring more than 42,000 square feet of retail and almost 300 housing units as well a parking structure.

Eric Larson, CEO of the Downtown Detroit Partnership, a civic advocacy organization, says Cosm entirely makes sense as the city continues to change from what was a primarily office district to in many ways an entertainment and residential enclave.

“Cosm is going to add just one more offering and a layer to what is a really important aspect of our economy moving forward.”

The groundwork, literally, is already in place. Detroit has four professional sports teams in facilities within a few blocks of one another — unique in the country — with notoriously loyal fans.

Moreover, it has the second largest theatre district in the U.S., after New York.

Larson said cellphone tracking of people’s movements shows “venues like Cosm provide a much longer stay duration” as they encourage people to combine entertainment with hospitality like food and drink.

And the downtown has been no slouch in attracting increasing visitors. Add street festivals and more than four million people last year “interacted in the public space that is directly outside the door of Cosm.”

Larson also says it’s wise for Bedrock to phase the second building, the residential tower, to align “with the various demand drivers.”

But increasingly the core is drawing residents in droves. The DDP launched a “15 by 15” projection 10 years ago for 15,000 new residents downtown and after 10 years there are some 10,000.

That’s largely due to entertainment and hospitality offerings, “the really amazing food opportunities.”

Residents trend younger and the fact all new residential must offer 20 per cent affordable housing keeps demographic diversity.

“That trajectory continues,” he said. “We’re just delivering about 1,000 units in the core of the downtown annually.”