Scott Croce’s mixed-use development at the northwest corner of Delaware Avenue and Virginia Street is shaping up. There will be 12 apartments plus office space in an ‘L’ shaped building and a restored rear carriage house. Croce, a chiropractor, plans to move his office to the first floor of the building. The Frizlen Group is architect and R&P Oakhill is general contractor.
On the ground level along Virginia Street there will be three private garages, two residential lobbies and one apartment. Four, one-bedroom units will occupy the second floor, and the four apartments on the third floor will be two-bedroom units on two levels. Each of the upper level apartments will have a terrace facing the interior of the site (below). Nineteen non-garage parking spaces, 11 of them covered, will be provided.
A historic brick carriage house on the Holloway Alley side of the property (above) will be converted into three additional apartments.
The site previously contained a residence where Mark Twain lived from 1870 to 1871. It was destroyed by fire in 1963, but the carriage house remained. The Cloister, one of Buffalo’s fabled restaurants, was opened by James D. DiLapo, Jr. in 1964 and closed in 1989. Business First and the Buffalo Law Journal occupied the building until 2001 when the publisher relocated to the Lafayette Court building on Main Street. The restaurant building was demolished in March 2012.