Buffalo - For Real

I just received a video on the City of Buffalo, New York from my aunt. In five gently narrated, beautifully filmed minutes, it imparts a glow and polish on an often maligned rust belt city that also happens to be my home town.

I left Buffalo just before I turned 7, so my early childhood memories are made up of time spent with my family in a modest house in suburban Kenmore and visits to my grandparents' place closer to downtown.

As a kid, I knew nothing of the history of the city, but Buffalo at one time was filled with wealth from its strategic location on the Erie Canal and Lake Erie, fueled by plentiful electricity generated at nearby Niagara Falls. Before so many Americans went west, Buffalo was a real place to be, and the wealthy businessmen and civic leaders built some amazing monuments to the city's prosperity.

The video celebrates Buffalo's "good bones" -- the infrastructure and cultural treasures that make it actually a pretty nice place to live if you like those kinds of urban amenities. There are Frank Lloyd Wright houses (Darwin Martin House in photo), a world-class symphony, an internationally recognized art gallery, beautiful parks, rows of century-old houses and other historic treasures. It looks picturesque and desirable on film.

It's also quite cold in Buffalo, but the video touches on it at the end, showing people playing in the snow, making snowmen, and hinting about being "lucky to be snowed in."

Between the images, the story and the compelling soundtrack, it certainly makes you want to visit. Maybe it's time to go catch up with some family.

Eichler Homes--Midcentury Modern

I was driving by the local Eichler development and saw a sign--so I drove up the hill to the Greenridge development. There I saw a 1963 property available. It "needs TLC" but is reduced 90 grand below it's comparable models. Well...

I'm not looking for a new house, but I spent four years living in an Eichler home when I was a teenager. They are noted for being open plans, with lots of glass--but it wasn't in front, it was inside. Think Frank Lloyd Wright for the masses. Eichlers were often no more expensive than ordinary boring tract homes but gave a particular style.

We brought our colonial style furniture out from Connecticut and plopped it down into our brand new Eichler and it looked a bit out of place. But we got used to the flow of the glass walled atrium (garden). I spent some of my weekends washing windows with a squeege and a bucket. That's my stingray bike parked in front of our house in the photo.

Check out an Eichler if you have a chance (and live in California). Joseph Eichler developed thousands of them during the 1960s and 70s.

A Greenridge development Eichler