White Noise: The Fairy Doors of Ann Arbor, MI

by Essie Shachar-Hill

Tucked away in a corner of the Ann Arbor District Library is the Fairytales and Folklore section. Here stand childhood stories like Snow White and Rumpelstiltskin.But the most magical part of the collection doesn’t lie in the fairytales, but in the bookshelf itself.

Carved into the side is a Fairy Door that leads to a miniature house inside several hollowed-out books. Little windows in the books’ spines reveal the house’s interior.

This is just one of dozens of tiny Fairy Doors found all over Ann Arbor. The first door was spotted in 1993 in the home of Jonathan Wright, a life-long Ann Arbor resident and a self-proclaimed “Fairyologist.”

Wright, a 52-year-old illustrator and graphic designer, is somewhat cryptic in describing his involvement with the doors.

“In some respects I’m a custodian and also a chronicler of what is happening around [the doors]: when they appear, when they disappear, [etc.].”

He maintains urban-fairies.com, a detailed page with pictures, locations, news and updates about the Fairy Doors.

In 2005 the first public Fairy Door appeared outside Sweetwaters Coffee and Tea. It has since vanished. Today, there are doors inside and outside local galleries, offices, shops, restaurants, and other businesses.

One of the first Fairy Doors appeared in 2005 at The Peaceable Kingdom, a toy store on Main Street. No one knew a door was going to be installed.
“It just kind of showed up [one day],” said Kelley Rubelman, a store employee since 1988.

Peaceable Kingdom's Fairy Door

This door is a particularly popular one, and one of Wright’s personal favorites.

The door leads to a “Fairy Store,” visible through the Fairy Door and through little windows inside The Peaceable Kingdom. Inside the miniature “store” are shelves and shelves of gifts left for the fairies by children over the years.

Children leave dolls, coins, candy, and even clothes on the little stoops all over town as presents for the fairies. Wright recalls some particularly memorable gifts, including inch-long hand-knit fairy socks, miniature hats complete with hatboxes, dime size pancakes, and live roses. These gifts end up in The Peaceable Kingdom’s Fairy Store, or in the annex that was built to accommodate the rapid influx of gifts.

A peek into the Fairy Store

The only thing missing from the store are the gifted coins, which Wright collects and donates.

“The fairies don’t really have any use for the coins, except for maybe the tooth fairy,” he says.

At the Ann Arbor District Library’s Fairy Door, a family of five is just starting its hunt for the fairies. This is the first door they have found, and the young daughter is visibly ecstatic.

“I’m leaving my lucky penny,” she says as she places it gently on the little stoop. “But you can’t open the doors,” she adds, a little disappointedly.

This fact is not apparent to many visitors of the Fairy Doors.

“Very often the doors get damaged, and sometimes it’s accidental because they are so inviting to curious people (kids and adults) to try [to open] them. And that’s to be expected to a certain extent,” Wright says.

But there is also a considerable amount of intentional vandalism to the doors. Recently, there has been a lull in new Fairy Doors, possibly due to vandalism. Wright says this damage has been disconcerting and that it has “impeded the advancement of the Fairy Doors.”

Jefferson Market on West Jefferson Street had an exterior and an interior Fairy Door, both of which were vandalized countless times. Eventually both doors disappeared but one reappeared out of reach, near the building’s roof.

In 2007, someone destroyed the door by setting it on fire. When the market closed in 2008, the door vanished.

Janet Quigley, an employee of 15 years at Selo/Shevel Gallery said its Fairy Door has also been vandalized several times.

“Everybody gets sad,” she said, although the doors are mysteriously repaired after each incident.

Although Wright gets discouraged, he says there is enough positive feedback to make up for the destruction. In fact, the most recent Fairy Door appeared just last month at the Michigan Theater on East Liberty Street. The miniature glass double-doors reveal a functioning fairy-sized movie screen.

Earlier this year a door appeared at Mott’s Children’s Hospital that grants access to the “Wing Wing” for bats, birds, and insects as well as fairies.

Although the doors get the most attention from young children, people of all ages appreciate them. At the library, a teenager slyly took a picture of the door with her iPhone before leaving a penny for the fairies.

Then again, there are those who just don't get it.

In the Google building, which houses a Fairy Door, a woman who had never heard of the doors asked, “What are they good for? Do you get anything by going to them?”

“Some people don’t have that experience growing up or imagining little creatures,” Wright says. “It really takes a certain level of fun and imagination to appreciate [the doors]. There are those who are more pragmatic and need an explanation.”