Ann Aikens

Aikens' children and many of her grandchilden have attended or now attend Cranbrook Schools. She was the wife of the late Robert Aikens, former chairman of Robert B. Aikens & Associates LLC, a Birmingham-based commercial real estate development and management firm. The gift to Cranbrook follows millions of dollars of support the couple made in earlier years to their alma mater, the University of Michigan. In 2013-14, the Aikenses made a $7.5 million donation to the Ann Arbor university to fund a hybrid operating room that combined radiology and surgery at the Samuel and Jean Frankel Cardiovascular Center. That followed a $10 million gift to UM's law school in 2009 to help fund the first expansion and renovation of the law school building since its 1933 opening. The project included the creation of the Robert B. Aikens Commons. The couple also has donated to UM's Penny W. Stamps School of Art & Design, where Ann Aikens earned a bachelor of fine arts degree in 2002.