DOWNTOWN BUFFALO is filled with unique and interesting architectural treasures. A good place to start is the beautiful Market Arcade on Main Street, designed by E. B. Green and W. S. Wicks and built in 1892. Today, it houses shops, a cafe, and the Visitors Center, where you will find maps and plenty of tourist brochures. Farther south on Main Street is the Neoclassical, beaux-arts Buffalo Savings Bank , now the M & T Center. It features an enormous dome covered with 140,000 sheets of 24-karat gold, and is another Green and Wicks design dating from 1901. During business hours, stroll inside to see the historic murals in the dome and on the walls. Also on Main Street is Lafayette Square, named after the Marquis de Lafayette, the French aristocrat and hero of the American Revolution who visited Buffalo in 1825. Also, Lafayete Square is where the great orators Daniel Webster and Henry Clay spoke in the 19th century. Make your visit during the summer on a Thursday evening and you can hear live music as part of "Thursday at the Square." Looking west from Lafayette Square, you will see an awesome view of Buffalo City Hall - an Art Deco masterpiece with an observation deck that offers a wonderful view of the entire city. On a clear day, you can see the mist from Niagara Falls from the obsrevation deck. Next door to Lafayette Square is the Liberty Bank , a 350-foot structure decked out with two reduced-scale replicas of the Statute of Liberty. On Church and Pearl Streets is the impressive St. Paul’s Episcopal Cathedral. During the school year, St. Paul's offers free music - the "Mid-day Recital" - every Friday from 12:30-1:00. The 500,000-square-foot Ellicott Square Building, on Main Street across from St. Paul's, opened in 1896 and remained the largest office building in the world until 1912. Inside, a stately courtyard is adorned with a glass roof and a mosaic floor. One M & T Plaza, on the corner of Main Street and North Division Street and dating from 1966, was designed by Minoru Yamasaki, the same architect who designed the twin towers of the World Trade Center in NYC. On Pearl and Swan Streets is another Green and Wicks' creation, the1894 Dun Building - Buffalo's very first skyscraper - named for Robert Dun of Dun & Bradstreet. Farther north, on Pearl and Church Streets is the Guaranty Building, Buffalo's second skyscraper and a world famous masterpiece of design by Louis Sullivan , Frank Lloyd Wright's one-time employer and mentor.
NORTH BUFFALO : To see a Frank Lloyd Wright restoration, visit the Darwin Martin Estate. This estate is considered to be one the finest and largest examples of his acclaimed “Prairie Style.” On Forest Avenue near Elmwood Avenue, The Buffalo State Hospital , now Buffalo Psychiatric Center, is a Romanesque monument designed by H. H. Richardson. This building is a National Historic Landmark. Finally, do not miss “ Millionaire’s Row,” on Delaware Avenue between Summer and Bryant Streets. The magnificent homes here are a living testiment to the Gilded Age.
