What’s New

BURCHFIELD AMONG THE BEST

The New Yorker magazine has named “Heat Waves in a Swamp: the Paintings of Charles Burchfield” as one of the best art exhibitions of 2009. The exhibit, organized by artist Robert Gober, is coming to Buffalo’s Burchfield Penney Art Center from March 6th through May May 23rd after a much acclaimed run at the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles. This is the first major retrospective of Burchfield’s work to be mounted in twenty years. After its appearance in Buffalo, the exhibition travels to the Whitney Museum in New York City in the summer of 2010.

GALLERY SCENE

Several new off-beat art galleries have recently opened around Buffalo, showcasing local talent in all types of media and performance.  Buffalo Artscape, The Vault and Sugar City serve as local gathering points highlighting art of all kinds.  Buffalo also has a variety of art galleries and performance venues of all different calibers.  For additional listings, click here.  

ALBRIGHT-KNOX ART GALLERY EXTENDED HOURS

Beginning November 3rd, the Albright-Knox Art Gallery will re-open to the public on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, making the gallery now open six days per week.  The Gallery has several upcoming exhibitions that are expected to be major draws for local and national tourists and is extending its hours to accommodate this anticipated demand.  The Gallery Shop and restaurant, muse, will also be open to the public during the new hours.    

NEW BUFFALO BOUTIQUE HOTEL UNDERWAY

Plans for the construction of a new boutique hotel in downtown Buffalo are currently underway.  Mark Croce, owner of several restaurants and bars in the city has stated that his new Franklin Street hotel will have 57 rooms and be marketed as an upscale destination.  The $19 million hotel project is set to be completed in late 2010.  

NEW DOWNTOWN HOTEL OPEN

A new luxury hotel, Embassy Suites, made its debut July 10th in Buffalo and covers a city block in the Central Business District. Buffalo's Theater District and Chippewa Entertainment District are within blocks and more than 50 restaurants are within a half a mile. Embassy Suites is a 150-room hotel complete with an on-site convenience store, full service beauty salon, an indoor pool, a fitness room and a business center. Each of its two-room suites has floor to ceiling exterior glass walls offering spectacular cityscape views. To learn more about this new hotel, visit www.embassysuites.com

RAVING ABOUT BUFFALO’S ARCHITECTURAL TREASURES

In an article titled, “Buffalo shows its pride by embracing architectural treasures of the past” The Cleveland Plain Dealer recently raved about Buffalo’s preservation efforts in the saving and restoration of the region’s architectural gifts from the past generations. Plain Dealer Architectural Critic Steven Litt said that "Buffalo is rising to the occasion, big time" when it comes to saving treasures like Frank Lloyd Wright’s Darwin D. Martin House Complex and Graycliff Estate, as well as The Roycroft Campus. The article also praises the artistic treasures residing at the Albright Knox Art Gallery and the new Burchfield Penney Arts Center. To read more, visit their website.

THE UNDER-400-MILE ESCAPE

Yet another major media outlet is noticing the exciting things going on in and around the City of Good Neighbors. Buffalo’s new Burchfield Penney Art Center, Frank Lloyd Wright’s Darwin Martin House and the newly restored Erie Canal Harbor are featured in a New York Magazine article highlighting “seven cheap, exciting, nearby spring trips.” Entitled “The Under-400-Mile Escape,” the article goes on to say that Buffalo “is in the midst of a renaissance.”  More...

WRIGHT HERE, WRIGHT NOW

Frank Lloyd Wright’s Darwin Martin House Complex truly comes into its own as a tourist destination with the opening of architect Toshiko Mori’s brilliant Greatbatch Pavilion on March 18th. This 8,000 square foot interpretive center will provide visitors to Wright’s Prairie Style masterpiece with museum quality exhibits, interactive touch screens, and a state-of-the-art orientation film that artfully and eloquently tell the story of Buffalo businessman Darwin D. Martin and the young man from Chicago who would go on to become the greatest architect of the 20th Century. More...

READY TEDDY:
THE ROOSEVELT HISTORIC SITE IS RESTORED AND EXPANDED

On September 14, 1901, Buffalo stepped into the national spotlight as Theodore Roosevelt took the oath of office as the nation’s 26th president following the assassination of President William McKinley.  In a simple ceremony in the library of the Ansley Wilcox house, Roosevelt began a journey that would forever alter the course of the United States and the office of the presidency itself.  Seventy years later, on September 14, 1971, the Ansley Wilcox house was opened to the public as a historic house museum, the Theodore Roosevelt Inaugural National Historic Site.

Extensive renovations to the historic home and the construction of a new addition on the site of the original Wilcox carriage house are nearing completion.  Beginning in spring 2009, the Site will introduce an all new guided tour experience, a multi-dimensional series of interactive approaches that will invite visitors to experience the site of Roosevelt’s inauguration as a dynamic tour through time.  Interactives, audio, lighting techniques, and a “storytelling” approach will transport visitors back to the drama of September, 1901.

THE NATIONAL TRUST FOR HISTORIC PRESERVATION NAMES BUFFALO AS ONE OF ITS 2009 DOZEN DISTINCTIVE DESTINATIONS

The National Trust for Historic Preservation has named Buffalo one of its 2009 Dozen Distinctive Destinations, citing the city’s “staggering range of cultural resources as well as some of the country’s most captivating architecture” as the rationale for Buffalo’s inclusion on this very prestigious list. Since 2000, the Trust has annually selected communities across the United States that offer cultural and recreational experiences different from the typical vacation destination. In the Trust’s estimation, Buffalo convincingly meets this standard. More...

BUFFALO NAMED ONE OF 44 PLACES TO GO IN 2009 BY THE NEW YORK TIMES

The New York Times has picked its 44 Places To Go in 2009 and Buffalo’s on the list, along with the likes of Washington, D.C., Berlin, Vienna and Copenhagen. According to The Times, the 44 destinations feature “this year’s most compelling destinations…awash in sublime landscapes, cutting-edge art and architecture, gala music festivals and stylish new resorts.” We’re thrilled to be a part of this impressive company and suggest you visit nytimes.com to see what The Times has to say about our fair city. More...

NEW BURCHFIELD PENNEY ART CENTER OPEN

After almost ten years of planning, fundraising and construction, the new Burchfield Penney Art Center opened to the public on November 22, 2008.  Designed by Gwathmey, Siegel & Associates Architects, the 84,000 square foot building will be certified at the “silver” level by the U.S. Green Building Council.  The museum is dedicated to the art and vision of Charles E. Burchfield and distinguished artists of Buffalo Niagara and Western New York State.  It houses more than 7,500 works by artists who have lived or worked in Western New York and contains the largest public collection of works by one of America’s greatest watercolorists, Charles E. Burchfield. 

NEW RAINFOREST FALLS EXHIBIT AT THE BUFFALO ZOO

The new M&T Bank Rainforest Falls exhibit opened at the Buffalo Zoo on September 10th, 2008.  The $16 million fully-enclosed Rainforest Falls is designed to be an experience unlike any other in Western New York. Modeled after the tepui (or flat-topped mountain) region of Venezuela, the exhibit houses a variety of species native to South America.  Guests can enjoy an interactive visitor’s center before entering the exhibit where they will spot dozens of free-flighted birds, monkeys, piranha and even a giant anaconda before being awed by a cascading replica of Angel Falls in the center of it all that plunges 25 feet.

ERIE CANAL HARBOR IS RESTORED

Erie Canal Harbor, America’s Gateway to the West, has been revived and restored and is now open to the public for the first time in generations.  The 184-year-old Commercial Slip has been excavated and re-watered, a replica “bowstring” pedestrian bridge that spans the slip has been built, a re-creation of the wooden Central Wharf put in place and foundations of Erie Canal-era buildings unearthed.  The $53 million heritage tourism site promises to become a must-see destination for American history buffs.

BUFFALO NAMED TOP ARTS DESTINATION

The April 2008 issue of AmericanStyle magazine has proclaimed Buffalo the “No. 1 Arts Destination for Mid-Sized Cities” in the publication’s annual “Top 25 Arts Destinations” poll. For more than a decade, arts travelers have trusted the magazine’s poll to guide them to emerging arts scenes and cultural meccas. The magazine cited the construction of the new Burchfield-Penney Art Center, the quality of the Albright-Knox Art Gallery collection and the development of Artspace Buffalo as a home for artists and artisans as reasons why Buffalo is a top-tier arts destination. More…

MARTIN HOUSE VISITORS CENTER

The Martin House Restoration Corporation (MHRC), which operates Frank Lloyd Wright’s landmark Darwin D. Martin House Complex, has announced a $2.5 million gift for its new, Toshiko Mori-designed visitor center pavilion. Wright’s largest Prairie Style complex (32,000 square feet) is currently undergoing a $40 million renovation to restore it to the original 1907 condition. The gift from the East Hill Foundation enables the MHRC to begin construction on the visitor center in late February with completion anticipated in late 2008. The 6,000-square-foot building will serve as the entryway for visitors and will house exhibits featuring architectural drawings and archival photographs of the Martin House.  More…

NATIONAL PRESERVATION CONFERENCE

The National Trust for Historic Preservation has announced that Buffalo will serve as the host city for the National Preservation Conference in 2011. The National Preservation Conference is the largest gathering of its kind in the United States, annually attracting more than 2,000 attendees to participate in a weeklong series of field sessions, education workshops, and tours that showcase outstanding local examples of architecture, historic preservation and community revitalization. Richard Moe, the president of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, noted that Buffalo was chosen for a variety of reasons, including the city’s rich architectural heritage. More…

ONE OF AMERICA'S TOP TEN NEIGHBORHOODS

Recently voted one of the country’s top ten neighborhoods by the American Planning Association, Buffalo’s Elmwood Village shares this heady designation with the likes of Brooklyn’s Park Slope, San Francisco’s North Beach and the Pike Place Market in Seattle. The APA selected the Elmwood Village because of its “vitality, broad spectrum of cultural and social assets, and its commitment to maintaining high community standards while solving real problems.” More…

FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT'S ROWING BOATHOUSE

Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fontana Boathouse made its long-awaited debut on Saturday, Sept. 29, 2007, at Buffalo’s West Side Rowing Club on the city’s Black Rock Channel. “After 100 years as a set of drawings gathering dust on a shelf, it is about time this famous Wrightian boathouse will finally come out of the ground and into the light,” said John C. Courtin, a founding director of FLW’s Rowing Boathouse Corporation. More …

LOUIS GRACHOS ON THE ALBRIGHT-KNOX ART GALLERY

Albright-Knox Art Gallery Executive Director Louis Grachos is the Buffalo Niagara CVB’s guest on the second episode of “American Masters, American Treasures,” the Buffalo podcast. Hear what he has to say about the second edition of the Beyond/In Western New York biennial exhibition, the arrival in Buffalo in November of the Panza Collection and what the future might hold for one of America’s great art museums. More …

FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT'S GARDENER'S COTTAGE TOURS

The Gardener’s Cottage is now included on the In-Depth and Focus Tours at Frank Lloyd Wright’s Darwin Martin House Complex. This delightful 1909 Wright designed building has rarely been seen by the public before now. Wright designed a cottage for the Martin family’s gardener as part of the overall estate plan in 1905, but it was not built until 1909. Lovingly restored and renovated in 1991, it is a lovely example of Wright’s design approach for an affordable home for a working class family. Now open for public viewing. More…

BUFFALO'S ARCHITECTURAL TREASURES VIDEO

“Buffalo's Architectural Treasures”, produced by WNED-TV and the Buffalo Niagara Convention & Visitors Bureau, provides a ten-minute introduction to the city writer R.W. Apple, in “Apple’s America”, called "a textbook for a course in modern American buildings.” Hosted by noted Buffalo lecturer, author and activist, Tim Tielman, the video is viewable in Flash format and as a podcast. More …

NEIL LEVINE ON FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT'S BUFFALO

Harvard University professor and noted Wright scholar and author Neil Levine chats with the Buffalo Niagara CVB about Buffalo's Frank Lloyd Wright architecture in the inaugural episode of “American Masters, American Treasures,” the Buffalo podcast. After touring Graycliff for the first time in ten years, Professor Levine called the 8-acre estate “surprisingly beautiful” and commented that “it’s actually going to have to be re-thought as part of Wright’s complete works.” More …