Kelsey Duda

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Leelanau’s influencers of 2024

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With 2024 in the rearview mirror and 2025 upon us, we’re recognizing 25 “influencers” we covered in the Glen Arbor Sun this past year who are making a meaningful impact on Leelanau County communities, commerce, and culture. Read below about those 25 local influencers, who include everyone from the Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians, to Leelanau Investing for Teens, to Empire’s polar dippers, to popular new destinations River Club Glen Arbor, the Sleeping Bear Inn, and the Lively’s NeighborFood Market.

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Creative Collaborators of Leelanau: Fernhaus Studio’s Kelsey Duda

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Leelanau County has long been a haven for artists and creatives, and the region is rife with individuals, businesses, and organizations working together towards common goals. For Kelsey Duda, co-founder and creative director of Fernhaus Studio, a hospitality group based in Traverse City, the region’s creative culture and collaborative community was a large part of what drew her to move to northern Michigan in 2020. In the three years since, the hospitality group has taken over Riverside Inn in Leland, Outpost (formerly Brew) in Traverse City, and perhaps most notably, restored The Mill in Glen Arbor, opening it in the spring of 2023 as a cafe. This summer, Fernhaus opened Millie’s in Glen Arbor, a pizza and ice cream shop where Riverfront Pizza was previously.

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The Mill launches Supper Club this Fall

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The Mill in Glen Arbor will launch its long anticipated restaurant this fall in the historic Braemmer flour mill on the Crystal River. The Mill announced its Supper Club on Instagram today with 12 dates between mid-October and mid-December. According to Kelsey Duda, owner of Fernhaus Studios, which manages The Mill, supper club tickets will start at $75 per person.

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Millie’s Pizza and Ice Cream opens on the Crystal River

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This summer means now. A sign reading “Opening this Summer” inside the window at Millie’s, the new pizza and ice cream restaurant on the footprint of the famed Riverfront Pizza, has been replaced by a new sign that reads “Grand Opening” and “Thursday to Sunday 12 pm to 8 pm.” Millie’s holds its grand opening on Thursday, Aug. 10, and features made-from-scratch “Roman Pizza al Taglio,” known for its semi-thick, light and fluffy interior and crispy exterior. Pizza slices, which cost $5 or $6 each, offer cheese, pepperoni, sausage and onion, or mushroom and roasted garlic. For dessert, Millie’s features ice cream in two flavors—cinnamon toast and dark cherry—crafted from a rich, custard base that uses cream, whole milk, sugar, salt and egg yolks. The restaurant is managed by Fernhaus Studio hospitality group, whose team also runs The Mill, another time-honored Glen Arbor landmark on the Crystal River, The Riverside in Leland, and Brew in Traverse City.

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Kissing the artist’s spring ground

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French-American artist Alyssa Smith display’s her work in two iconic Leelanau County locations—Farm Club and The Mill in Glen Arbor. Three ceramic pieces from her work “A Hundred Ways to Kiss the Ground” are currently at Farm Club. Her “found object” piece “Buckets” is on display at The Mill in Glen Arbor. “Alyssa instantly had the concept for “Buckets” on her first walk through The Mill, and I could not love this piece more,” said Kelsey Duda, creative director of Fernhaus Studio and The Mill. “I would never have thought of combining the pieces together the way she did, transforming artifacts into a work of art.”

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Corey Smith prepares to manage The Mill opening this spring

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The much anticipated reopening of the historic Brammer gristmill on the Crystal River is near, though owner Turner Booth and the Fernhaus hospitality group have yet to name a date. On March 1 they introduced The Mill’s general manager Corey Smith on social media. Smith, a native of South Haven and a University of Michigan graduate, returned to the mitten state and joined The Mill team last May after working in real estate in New York City and hospitality in Hudson, a town in upstate New York.

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