Above: Angela Blocker-Loyd works with a student at the Dream Detroit Skating Academy.
By Mimi McKinnis
Every time Candice Tamakloe thought she was done with skating, she’d get pulled back in — first by a stint performing in Rory Flack’s “Ebony on Ice,” then as a coach and skating director for the Renaissance Figure Skating Club, then as a member of the Harmony Theater Company. Good thing her friend Angela Blocker-Loyd had the same problem.
“I stopped skating after college, but it was always there. I always kept my skates,” Blocker-Loyd, who also works as the owner of Studio Detroit Dance Center, said. “One day I was asked to work with an after-school program and they offered skating as one of their activities. I instantly fell back in love with the sport. I’d post videos of myself on the ice and everyone kept telling me I should get back to it and really do something.”
It all started some 25 years ago when the pair met while skating with the Berkley Royal Blades Figure Skating Club. After brushing off the notion of starting a skating program multiple times, Blocker-Loyd gave it some thought and decided to throw the idea at an old friend. And with that, Tamakloe was pulled back onto the ice again.
“It’s been a dream of mine to have a club that’s actually in Detroit,” Tamakloe said, noting that the Detroit Skating Club relocated to Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, in 1978, and the Berkley Royal Blades dissolved in 2010. “When Angela and I got to talking about the idea, we just jumped in and took off.”
With both partners on board, the Dream Detroit Skating Academy was launched Jan. 29, 2022, with a kickoff clinic at Jack Adams Memorial Arena, attended by 70 interested families. The program is the only of its kind to be co-owned by two Black women and hopes to meet the community where it is with long-term opportunities on the ice.
“We want to expose kids to something different, something other than basketball, running track, or things they’ve already seen,” Blocker-Loyd said. “With skating there’s friendships and lessons, but there’s also options. You can pursue the sport and pursue a future in it, whether that’s as a coach, a director, a competitor or in shows like with Disney on Ice.”
Tamakloe agreed, adding that skating doesn’t have to be the Olympics or nothing. Through DDSA, they hope to showcase those opportunities and provide high-level programming that’s both local and affordable so skaters can train where they live, not in the suburbs.
“We want to offer quality instruction where skaters don’t have to leave their backyard and commute,” Tamakloe said. “We want a skater to make it on the national and international stage and be able to say, ‘I’m from Detroit. I skate in Detroit.’ It’s time for a skater to come from the city.”
“To be doing this all these years later with Candice is crazy,” Blocker-Floyd said. “We started something we’re proud of, but we couldn’t have gotten it off the ground without the Jack Adams facility. They’ve been so supportive. They gave us a home.”
For more information, visit www.dreamdetroitskate.com.
