The Coles House Project

“Buffalo…..who knew” that Louise Blanchard Bethune was the first woman to practice architecture in the US?

“Buffalo…..who knew” that the first woman to practice architecture in the US, the first woman member of the American Institute of Architects and the first woman to be made a Fellow of the A.I.A was Buffalo’s own Louise Blanchard Bethune? Bethune, who apprenticed with esteemed Buffalo architect Richard A. Waite as of 1876, launched her own firm in 1881 and, then, another with her husband in 1891, ultimately designed approximately 180 (known) buildings in Buffalo and Western New York. While [...]

Clint Brown discusses Olmsted’s Elmwood

“Buffalo… who knew” that one of the city’s neighborhoods has been recognized as one of the country’s 10 best neighborhoods by the American Planning Association?  Elmwood Village, which started to take form in the post-Civil War period, was developed as a city within a park framework—in this case, Frederick Law Olmsted’s Delaware Park.  Elmwood then went into a period of decline from the 1920s until the 1990s but has experienced 20+ years of resurgence, growth, and in-migration.  Today, it represents one of the [...]

A Conversation with Dennis Maher of Assembly House 150 and Fargo House

“Buffalo…who knew” that there is a center of art, design, and construction housed in an early 20th Century church located just outside of downtown? Led by artist, architect and visionary, Dennis Maher, Assembly House 150 is an “architectural dreamworld” that includes classrooms for students, stories high sculptures, a gallery and studio where artists and tradespeople collaborate on architectural and artistic projects, and a design and building studio.Assembly House is an extension of the ongoing Fargo House project, Maher’s home and [...]

Buffalo’s Historic Colored Musicians Club is the only continuously running, all-Black owned club in the US

“Buffalo…Who Knew” that the HIstoric Colored Musicians Club is the only continuously running, all-Black owned club in the US? This historically-significant site was founded in 1917 when the all-white musicians union, Local 43, refused to include African American musicians in the union. A separate union, Buffalo Local 533, was thus formed, making Buffalo the eighth city in the United States with a racially-segregated musicians’ local union.  From there, a close-knit group of its members formed a social club, which still exists today as [...]

The Coles House Project

“Buffalo…..who knew” that Robert T. Coles, a Buffalo-born and MIT-educated architect, launched the first African American-owned architecture firm in New York State and in the Northeast? And that his house, located on Humboldt Parkway, is poised to become Buffalo’s next house museum and cultural site?  Coles was the first African American to win the Rotch Traveling Scholarship awarded by the Boston Society of Architects,[1] the first African American Chancellor of the American Institute of Architects (AIA),[2] the first AIA Vice-President for Minority Affairs, and [...]