Buffalo at the Crossroads is a diverse set of cutting-edge essays. The twelve authors highlight the outsized importance of Buffalo, New York, within the story of American urbanism. Across the contributions to this collection, the authors consider the history of Buffalo's built environment in light of contemporary developments and in relationship to the evolving interplay between nature, industry, and architecture.Essays examine Buffalo's architectural heritage in rich context: the Second Industrial Revolution; the City Beautiful movement; world's fairs; grain, railroad, and shipping industries; urban renewal and so-called white flight,; as well as the larger networks of labor and production that set the city's economic fate. The contributors pay attention to currents that connect contemporary architectural work in Buffalo to the legacies established by its esteemed architectural founders: Richardson, Olmsted, Adler, Sullivan, Bethune, Wright, Saarinen, and others.Buffalo at the Crossroads is a compelling introduction to Buffalo's architecture and developed landscape that will frame discussion about the city for years to come

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction Buffalo at the Crossroads -- 1. “The Olmsted City”: Heritage Landscapes and Civic Identity in Twentieth-Century Buffalo -- 2. The Peace Bridge and the Rhetoric of Hospitality at the US-Canada Border -- 3. Of Silo Dreams and Deviant Houses: Uneven Geographies of Abandonment in Buffalo, New York -- 4. “In the Thought of the World”: Frank Lloyd Wright’s Larkin Administration Building -- 5. Max Abramovitz’s Temple Beth Zion: “An Airport for the Spirit, Where the Soul Takes Off for Heaven” -- 6. Putting the Rust in Rust Belt: Architectural Tourism and Industrial Heritage -- 7. Anticipating Images: Buffalo Industry under Construction, 1906–1943 -- Part III: Buffalo as Experiment -- 8. In the Buffalo Community, but Not of It: Polish Migrants, Urban Poverty, and the American Nation in Buffalo at the Turn of the Twentieth Century -- 9. Upstate and Downstate Avant-Gardes: Artists and Artist Communities in Postindustrial Buffalo and New York City during the 1970s -- 10. Lake Effect: Art and Childhood in 1970s Buffalo -- 11. Rust Belt Cosmopolitanism: Resettlement Urbanism in Buffalo, New York -- 12. Cropping the View: Reyner Banham and the Image of Buffalo -- Coda -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Contributors -- Index