Crews are, at this moment, working on removing unsalvageable components of the Old First Ward’s historic Cooperage building. This news might at first appear to be a bad omen, but fortunately that is not the case. Next week, an announcement will be made that preservation efforts will ultimately save most of this structure. Apparently, moneys have been secured in order to launch a six-week shoring up process that will ultimately make the Cooperage a candidate for a loft conversion. It was not long ago that we saw a neighbor to this property, McBrides Tavern, come crashing down. Many have been…
Author: Chef Bill Metzgar
American and Canadian cyclists will be happy to hear that the current International cycling quagmire is being improved. If you have attempted to bike across the bridge this summer, then you know how difficult it can be – especially the first time. Sometimes, there is no one to greet you on the Canadian side. And competing with the line of secondary referrals on the American side can be maddening. Next year, the plan is to have dedicated personnel and turn-style stations to expedite cyclists from country to country. The Public Bridge Authority has recognized that there are major issues when…
A couple of Radio City Rockettes were in town to promote an upcoming Radio City Christmas Spectacular. Earlier today I fielded a call from a friend who said, “Am I losing my mind or did I just see Mayor Brown out in front of City Hall with a couple of Rockettes?” I told her that I had heard that the Rockettes were coming to town, so she was on point with her observation. By the time I arrived at the steps of City Hall, Mayor Brown was escorting the Rockettes across the street to their SUV limousine. Moments later I…
Every time I ride down Porter Avenue, I am constantly aware of a few different elements. The stretch that I’m talking about is between Kleinhans Music Hall and LaSalle Park. Over the last few years we have witnessed some very positive developments including the opening of Morning Glory Cafe, the re-watering of the Mirror Pool, the rehab of the ‘Circle Mansion’… and who could forget this miraculous ‘save’ that saw an out-of-town real estate investor completely gut and restore a house that no one in Buffalo would touch? With all of the development efforts, I am amazed that certain ‘investors’…
Robby Takac has just announced that he is going to host an impromptu DJ performance tomorrow at Buffalo State College. In order to promote this weekend’s Music is Art event, Robby will kick off the live event from 12:15pm to 1:30pm at the Campbell Student Union Quad. The only other time I have had a chance to catch Robby spinning, he packed the house at Stillwater on Delaware (photo – crowd @ Amungus show). Now Buffalo State students are in for a special treat as they will get a sneak peak as to what can be expected at Saturday’s blow-out.…
This morning I met with Ron Rienas of the Public Bridge Authority to discuss the possibility of new city signage and waymarking. At this point in time, it is easy to find your way out of Buffalo from the Peace Bridge, yet relatively impossible to find the Elmwood Village, Allentown or Downtown. Why is that? How hard would it be to fix that? Ron didn’t think that the proposal would be that difficult to put into action. He told me that the Public Bridge Authority would consider paying for a waymarking signage at the intersection of Baird and Porter if…
It was really only a few years ago that this house, located at the corner of Elmwood and Lafayette, was a complete disaster. Basically, it was a rooming house where a number of notorious shoplifters resided. One of those shoplifters regularly caused havoc at my store on Elmwood. Then Eran Epstein of E-Square Capital purchased the property and rehabbed it. Overnight this property went from flop house to housing legitimate tenants. Fast forward a couple more years and this house is positioned to host its first commercial tenant. And don’t think that I’m talking about low-profile business that would hide…
Friday evening I witnessed one of the more bizarre events of the summer – ‘Monsters of Nature and Design II’ (part of Gusto at the Gallery). Cutting to the chase I can only sum it up this way – there are some folks out there, like George Hughes from Ghana, who really get off by smashing large musical instruments… namely pianos. We were not sure what to expect when we walked up to the back steps of the Albright-Knox. What we found was George and friends smashing a piano accompanied by the Vores (12 piece orchestra). The musicians helped to…
If you have a keen eye, you might have noticed that a swarm of cicadas has landed in Allentown. The artistic bugs have attached themselves to storefronts, signs and lampposts. In fact, if you’ve lived in Buffalo for any duration of time, you should be familiar with the living version of these artistic creatures – the cicada. Back on ’05 I was talking to one of my neighbors when one a screeching cicada flew out of the sky and hit him on the head. At that time I wrote this post. Now the cicadas are back in a more colorful…
When I first stepped through the doors of the close-to-completed Burchfield-Penney Art Center, I was immediately drawn to what looked like the café. This morning I called David Tanner (COO) to ask him what visitors can expect from the café in the future. He told me that the café would be run in-house (for now), and that since Oliver’s was the exclusive caterer, utilizing full access to the kitchen, the café would focus primarily on pre-made items such as sandwiched and wraps. It sounds as if the café will also pride itself on the organic and free trade handcrafted coffees…