Crypto Connect at 225 Speakeasy

Join us for Crypto Connect at the new 225 Speakeasy for a night of connection and ideas shaping the future of Web3.

Note: Please register on our partner’s event page to RSVP: [https://luma.com/ai9rxavz](https://luma.com/ai9rxavz)
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**Drinks On Us**
We’ve got drinks on the house and a room full of people shaping Detroit’s emerging tech scene—founders, builders, investors, creatives, and the crypto-curious.

​This is a **social-first mixer** designed to make it easy to meet people, start conversations, and plug into Michigan’s growing tech & crypto ecosystem.
​Food is also available to order at the speakeasy from Atwater Brewery.
​Throughout the evening, we’ll also feature a **talk from Nick George**, sharing how AI tools are lowering the barrier to building—giving attendees a chance to connect *and* walk away with something practical to apply.

**FEATURED TALK:**
**AI ASSISTED CODING FOR NON-TECHNICAL BUILDERS**
​Don’t miss this talk from[ Nick George](https://nockgarden.com/?utm_source=luma), Events and Ecosystem Builder for Crypto and AI, and Founder of Dryad.
Nick will lead a conversation about how to use the latest AI tools to bring your ideas to life and actually build things — whether that’s a website, a dashboard, an app, an agent frontend, or just an idea you’ve been sitting on. He’ll walk through how to go from raw idea to real project— from research and project framing to building and refining towards your vision. Whether you’ve shipped a dozen projects or have never written a line of code, this one’s for you.

Optional for those interested in the AI talk:
If you’d like to get live feedback from Nick after the talk, you’re welcome to bring your laptop and a work in progress. We’ll have tables set aside for this. He’ll dig into real pain points with you: whether that’s getting Claude, Codex, or local setups like OpenClaw/Hermes working smoothly for your workflow. Or if you’ve been curious about AI but haven’t jumped in yet, we can walk you through how it actually integrates with your projects.

**SPEAKER BIO**
​[Nick George](https://nockgarden.com/?utm_source=luma)
Events and Ecosystem Builder for Crypto and AI, Founder of Dryad.
Ex- Dr. Sushi, Serotonin, Story Protocol.

Nick George is an ecosystem and events operator with a background in live production, brand experience, and program design. At Story Protocol, he served as Events Lead, managing more than $3M in global event spend across flagship activations in Seoul and Denver — covering strategy through execution: budgeting, sponsorships, speaker ops, vendor management, and on-site production. He also designed Surreal World Assets, a builder program that reached 1,900+ registrants, supported 75+ community events across four continents, and moved multiple teams into active incubation. Before Story, he helped scale event-led ecosystem growth at Serotonin across clients including Robinhood, PayPal, and Protocol Labs.
​Outside of crypto, Nick founded and ran Dr. Sushi — Michigan’s first sustainable sushi operation — for ten years out of Detroit, and continues to produce Far Off Sounds (music documentary series) and Pure Rave (experimental turntablism, est. 2016).

**PARKING**
Bonus: free parking in the adjacent lot — easy in, easy out.

**COHOSTED BY**
Elizabeth Hansson and Nick George

**THANK YOU TO OUR SPONSORS:**

* Stand With Crypto
​[Stand With Crypto](https://www.standwithcrypto.org/?utm_source=luma) is a non-prodit and grassroots advocacy organization committed to supporting the 52 million Americans in the U.S. that own crypto. Stand With Crypto is driving progressive blockchain regulatory initiatives and working to ensure the rules being written in Congress today protect your right to participate in the financial revolution.
* DRYAD
**​**[Dryad](https://dryad.vercel.app/?utm_source=luma) is an autonomous AI agent that manages native habitat restoration on 9 vacant lots in Detroit, funded entirely by USDC DeFi yield so it never needs ongoing donations or grants. It monitors biodiversity through iNaturalist, hires and pays contractors in USDC, and records every decision onchain.

**REGISTRATION**:
This event is hosted in partnership with Detroit Blockchain Collective.
**Please register on our partner’s event page to RSVP:** https://luma.com/ai9rxavz

Registration is required.