MusicalFare’s “Falsettos”: Growing Up Is Hard to Do
Posted on Thursday, March 11th, 2010
by bunjamin
Pictured (l to r): Pamela Rose Mangus, Michele Marie Roberts, Ben Schafer, John Fredo, Marc Sacco, Louis Colaiacovo and Debbie Pappas in “Welcome to Falsettoland.” Photo: Chris Cavanagh/MusicalFare Theatre
“Falsettos” at MusicalFare: Growing Up Is Hard to Do
By Ben Siegel
Jason has been pushed into a corner. He cannot, at the tender but surprisingly wise age of 11, find in his unconventional family the one thing he desperately needs: Stable guidance. His parents, loonier than Canadian currency, take turns unraveling themselves in front of our precocious pre-teen. As an audience, we are merely along for the ride––an awkward, uncomfortable, confusing and occasionally toxic ride.
But don’t let this drama fool you. “Falsettos” is a comedy. Composer and lyricist William Finn (with co-librettist James Lapine) does everything he can to make you forget that the story of Jason, his divorced parents Trina and Marvin, Marvin’s lover Whizzer (the much younger man he left Trina for), the family’s psychiatrist Mendel (who courts and marries Trina), and the lesbian couple next door, is something other than hilarious. Oftentimes, this family on the brink of total self-destruction has only a gimmicky show tune or reverent bar mitzvah ceremony to hold itself together.
It’s Yiddish theater, only with less Yiddish and more homosexuality.
MusicalFare Theatre is enjoying a current revival of its popular 1995 staging of “Falsettos,” a combination of two one-act musicals (1981’s “March of the Falsettos” and 1990’s “Falsettoland”) that are bookmarked by the rarely seen 1978 one-act, “In Trousers.” The show’s last mounting, at the now-defunct downtown Pfeifer Theatre, was warmly received (though unseen by this reviewer, who was busy planning for his own bar mitzvah that year).
Three cast members from that production––John Fredo (Marvin), Pamela Rose Mangus (the caretaking Dr. Charlotte) and Debbie Pappas (Trina)––reprise their roles in this staging. Three of MusicalFare’s youngest and brightest stalwarts––Louis Colaiacovo (Mendel), Marc Sacco (Whizzer) and Michele Marie Roberts (lesbian kosher caterer Cordelia)––and Orchard Park seventh grader Ben Schafer, as Jason, round out the cast.
It is a tall order to weave this many individual characters into a pleasing portrait of relatives and friends. Director Randall Kramer realizes the strengths of most of his bunch, though runs into trouble with a few of the central relationships.
Whizzer is Marvin’s young, cool, attractive new mate. It is reasonable that a soul-searching 11-year-old would confide in a figure like Whizzer when his parents are clearly not up to the task. But rarely do we feel that special bond between the two youngsters, which is important, especially when their connection is what eventually helps tie up loose ends. They need each other’s relative sanity in times of strife, though their do-or-die desperation isn’t always apparent in their scenes together.
Fredo’s Marvin is a curious one. He asks for our patience in understanding his fragmented family, but then doesn’t go on to prove he is worth it. It’s as if he thinks his ex-wife’s neuroses (which Pappas nails exquisitely in “I’m Breaking Down”), his son’s desire for balance, and his lover’s need for attention just appeared out thin air. One can’t blame Marvin for outing himself and attempting to pick up the pieces––especially courageous given the volatile political climate of the 1980s––but Fredo doesn’t bother endearing himself to his audience, who could use his sympathy the most.
Colaiacovo, as Mendel, does a fine job giving his patients some psychoanalytical perspective, especially in the adorably irreverent “Everyone Hates His Parents,” though you must take it all with a grain of salt. This is the doctor, after all, who marries a patient’s ex-wife, also a patient.
If there’s one thing you can say about Finn’s view of the modern American family, it’s that love, like life, is not always fair. “Love is blind / Love can tell a million stories / Love’s unkind / Spiteful in a million ways,” this motley crew sings at the top of the show. They sure live up to it.
The mistake one might make when looking at Finn’s work is that his characterizations appear shallow. Take other “crazy upbringing” stories made trendy by a slew of early-2000s young, gay memoirists. David Sedaris and Augusten Burroughs have their own takes on what disconnects a room of related people. Their stories are no less clever, no less painful, than that of the family in “Falsettos,” though perhaps where Finn succeeds is by capitalizing on the theatricality of it all.
If it can appear in this show, from time to time and song to song, that revealing a family’s zaniness is the only way to be irreverent about one’s adolescence, that being quirky is the only way to be unique, then that would be selling Finn’s semi-autobiographical work way short. True, his caricatures––I mean characters––are often too frenzied to be recognizable as real, their trials and tribulations too sensational to be moving. But I dare you to find a family story that’s steeped in honesty and not simultaneously bonkers. Finn is nothing if not honest, and therein lies the value here.
In Jason, we have a hero we can root for, even want to save ourselves. His brief moments of interjecting narration remind us that Finn’s star is his own wit. And that’s all right, considering Schafer’s adept timing. His eyes roll as if on a river, yet it’s apparent it’s not because he gives Mrs. Schafer a hard time at home. He clearly understands the cynicism of this piece, and exploits it only within the confines of his character’s narrative.
That a young actor can possess such maturity on stage––thoughtful, informed maturity, mind you; not an ability to merely stand still––is essential in this show. It means the world to Jason’s wackadoo family that he can be the sole grown-up even when he should not have to be. Ultimately they turn to him for guidance, in a final scene that exhibits this young man’s unreasonable sense of reason and Finn’s poetic pen. This is where our tensions begin to ease, for the first and only time.
It is in this melodramatic, but satisfying, end that we understand what Jason has been trying to tell us all along: Growing up is hard to do, but it’s a lot easier than not growing at all.
For more information about “Falsettos” at MusicalFare Theatre, in residence at Daemen College in Amherst, visit MusicalFare.com. The show runs through April 3.
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Issue 18: Back to the Future
Posted on Thursday, March 11th, 2010
by block club
Back to the Future
By Ben Siegel Photos by Steve Soroka
See this story in the magazine here.
You can’t throw a stone in the City of Buffalo without hitting a landmark. Not that you’d want to be throwing anything at one of our city’s storied homes or commercial buildings, which span nearly two centuries of architectural, cultural, economic and political references. But you’d be hard pressed to find a building that someone didn’t care very deeply about, on a personal level.
Before this last decade––which has seen an onslaught of progressive rehabilitation and restoration projects, with more zeal than ever before––you might not have had the opportunity to know about these properties, much less be able to step inside them. But with this new century’s eye toward urban redevelopment, groups like Preservation Buffalo Niagara, People United for Sustainable Housing (PUSH) and Buffalo Re-Use, to name just a few, are building the city’s future on the foundation of its history.
That proud, avid Buffalo residents are stepping up to the plate to re-claim their city’s heritage is extraordinary, says Preservation Buffalo Niagara president Catherine Schweitzer.
“Some people would say that almost the entire City of Buffalo would qualify as an historic district. There is this movement in Buffalo that [believes] we can’t wait for City Hall, that it’s got to be citizen-grassroots-based,” says Schweitzer.
The City of Buffalo Preservation Board estimates that roughly 3,500 properties, many of which fall within the discriminating boundaries of the city’s nine historic districts, are designated as local historical landmarks. These districts comprise much of downtown and the West Side, though many pockets of popular neighborhoods, such as the Elmwood Village, Ashland and Norwood Avenues, Bidwell and Chapin Parkways, and much of the East Side, are not included. Approximately 2,300 properties are listed on the National Register of Historic Places, with some properties appearing on both local and national lists.
These districts come with not only a heavy dose of civic and cultural pride, but eligibility for funding, stricter zoning regulations, and tax credits for homeowners to aid in the restoration or rehabilitation of their property, such as the residential tax credit law signed by Gov. David A. Paterson in July 2009. The law, sponsored by Assembly Member Sam Hoyt, covers 20 percent of qualified rehabilitation costs up to $50,000.
While Schweitzer says that not enough homeowners are taking advantage of grants, financing is just one obstacle.
“Historic preservation is a very high hurdle for people to get past. They don’t see it as a green movement. They don’t see it as a neighborhood movement. They don’t see it as a keeping-a-sense-of-place movement. They see it as a set of rules and regulations that ordinary people cannot achieve. And that’s the dilemma,” says Schweitzer.
“Our mission is about building a movement. It’s about encouraging people to do the right thing with the environment here. Whatever that means,” she says. “It’s changing the perception of preservation as something that’s positive.”
One plus one
An afternoon drive or stroll down one of the city’s more charming streets in Allentown portrays a row of charmed Victorian homes, artfully decorated in pastry-like daintiness with pretty pastels and scalloped rooflines.
Property after property line narrow sidewalks with manicured lawns and gardens inbetween.
As if there weren’t already a multitude of details and pleasantries to notice, there is a plaque adorning a sycamore, claiming it as the oldest tree in Buffalo. It is abundantly apparent that these homes, which look pleasingly antiquated, are from an era past.
The confluence of these observations, from the stories of these houses to the care and attention paid to them by their owners, is what gives Allentown resident Christina Akers great pride in her neighborhood. It is also what has propelled Akers, a political consultant, to take an active role in her neighborhood’s preservation.
“I think preservation is most successful when it’s grassroots and it comes from the ground up,” says Akers. “When it comes from the residents. I think preservation is less successful when it comes from the top down, when people misunderstand what the standards are.”
Akers served as executive director of the Allentown Association in 2005, during which time she became acquainted with the city’s standards for the historic district. Though many and specific, Akers says the rules are there for a reason.
“You can’t just tear down a Victorian porch and put up a car pad,” she says. “[These standards] allow you, as a historic property owner, the assurance of knowing that not only can you not do that, but your neighbors can’t either. It maintains the integrity of the historic fabric of your neighborhood.”
It is a series of small and specific code stipulations that add up to a greater whole.
“I can’t imagine our community without these historic resources being protected,” says Akers. “Houses aren’t these isolated places. They have neighbors, they have streets, they have trees, they have sidewalks, they have benches, they have playgrounds. That’s what makes Allentown ‘Allentown.’ You can’t divorce the house from the street in the neighborhood. And why would you? You have one plus one plus one, and then you have a neighborhood.”
Not your grandmother’s history
Henry McCartney, who moved here recently from Rochester to become the executive director of Preservation Buffalo Niagara, has worked his entire career in the historic preservation industry. As executive director of the Landmark Society of Western New York, a Rochester-based historical society that promotes preservation in that city, McCartney developed an understanding of ther word “preservationist.”
It is not the comm- unity-by-committee mentality some fear, one that enforces impossible standards.
“I think sometimes preservationists can be too harsh,” says McCartney, who cites two of Rochester’s “house museums”–– properties maintained to very exact and exhaustive historical detail, inside and out––as extreme cases of preservation.
There you do everything to the purist architectural standards. You’re not going to change anything, including the kitchens.” He says this standard of historic preservation is good for exhibit, but not for living. “There have got to be very few people who want to live with an 1890s kitchen.”
To the reassurance of many, antiquity is no longer the preservationist trend; innovative restoration is.
“Some preservationists would want a museum-quality restoration,” says Akers. “Some preservationists, and I would dare say many of us, would say that these should be places where we use and live and enjoy. These are living spaces. They’re not perfect; they’re not exactly as they were built. But they’re still in a historic preservation district.”
Akers says that Allen Street Hardware, Mark Goldman’s popular bar and restaurant on Allen Street in an old hardware store, is a prime example of the kind of creative re-use old buildings are capable of achieving.
“They’re not pristine museum-quality, but they have a life and they’re being re-used, but in a way that respects the historic context of the environment,” says Akers.
Still, as the movement has evolved since the signing of the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966, so has the understanding of what it means to preserve.
Schweitzer sees it as a matter of our city’s past informing its own future.
“People want to leave their mark on the world. Leave their sense of place. Taking a house that is shabby and under-loved or under-cared-for, and making a concerted effort over five years, 10 years, 20 years, to bring it back to its proud state, is a way of leaving your mark on the world. Or, in a way, giving back to the City of Buffalo,” says Schweitzer.
But as time progresses, so does what we consider to be historic. The National Register of Historic Places deems eligibility of properties for historic distinction at 50 years old. That means that this year, buildings built in 1960––more than a century younger than some of the historic homes in the West Village of Buffalo––become eligible. Homes in the Village of Kenmore––the city’s first suburb, established in 1899––and the hamlet of Snyder in Amherst, established in 1837, are areas outside of the city that don’t get noticed as often for their historic significance. This gap in understanding what constitutes history throws people for a loop.
“Preservationists seem to stop at classical Georgian Tudor, Queen Anne Victorian––identifiable styles––but to suddenly take in Philip Johnson’s Glass House is innovative,” says Schweitzer. “In two years, the [Gordon Bunshaft-designed 1962 addition to the] Albright-Knox Art Gallery will be 50 years old, and it will be eligible for the National Historic Registry. I think it is one of the most elegant, beautiful buildings I’ve ever seen. And yet in its stripped-down, spare black shape, it is equally elegant to the white marble temple forum [of the original 1905 Greek Revival gallery building]. What great companions they are: Black, white. As spare and clean as you can possibly be, to the most embellished, adorned; and yet two different centuries.”
It will be the conversation between old and new architectural idioms in residential and commercial spaces, she says, that will help define the future structural style of Buffalo. And yet, at some point, 2010 will be thought of as historical.
“Nothing stops in time. We’re not Pompeii where we’ve been frozen in lava,” says Schweitzer, “though it feels that way from time to time. But when we add to the built environment, what are the proportions or scale or design elements that make a new building beloved and wonderful and fitting in this city? If we don’t pay attention to establishing those expectations as a city, we won’t retain our sense of place.”\
The future is now
It would be near-sighted to assume that the preservationist movement is concerned with just structures. The process starts with one house, though as Akers pointed out, the work of one homeowner begets the work of another homeowner, and so on, until suddenly an entire street and neighborhood have received attention. That might take a few years or it might take a decade, depending on the condition of properties and the availability of residents.
But the hard work goes even beyond that community. The effects of historic preservation on the city at large are layered and interconnected. As properties are re-invested into, property assessments go up (which often means higher property taxes, but also higher resale values on those homes). Though this teeter-tottering effect can have its setbacks, on the whole it raises the real estate and cultural value of a city. It shows newcomers, and naysayers, that its residents care about their community, and will fight for its betterment and survival.
This philosophy will be on the minds of those attending 2011’s National Preservation Conference here, a first for Buffalo and according to Schweitzer, the “most important visitation a community with significant architecture could achieve.”
The five-day conference, which visits the northeast every five years, will highlight local preservation trends, the region’s rich architectural history, and a host of other topics. It is estimated that upwards of 2,000 people will come to town for the event, bringing an expected boost to local retailers, restaurants, hotels and attractions.
“Because this conference is so well known around the country, it has a significant reputation of quality and high expectations. Securing the bid was a catalyst to adjust the chatter about Buffalo, both outside and inside [the area],” says Schweitzer.
McCartney agrees that there’s buzz these days about Buffalo’s resources. The Buffalo Niagara Convention and Visitors Bureau has played a significant role in the attention Buffalo is getting out of town, as well as in bringing tourists here to see for themselves. McCartney calls the bureau’s focus on the city’s architecture the “calling card” of their campaigns, and says it’s paying off.
“I think there are only a handful of cities that could capitalize on their heritage in architecture,” says McCartney, citing Savannah, Ga. and Charleston, S.C. as towns that have succeeded.
Holding hands with history and forging ahead is a balancing act, often involving political and financial hurdles. But what seems to be at the center of every preservationist’s concern is the desire to hold onto the past so that it may still exist in the future. It’s the designation of a structure––a home, an office building, a church, a park system––as something important that endears a people to that city, whether they live there or are visiting.
“I think preservation means different things to different people,” says Akers. “We’re really lucky in Buffalo, I would say, to have such a diverse preservation community. What it means to me as an urban planner, it means that our community says that this place is important. That this place is so special and so beautiful it’s worthy of extra protection.”
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Issue 18: Beth and Jason’s ’50s house
Posted on Thursday, March 11th, 2010
by block club
Take a look inside Beth and Jason’s home and see how their vintage 1950s look is carried throughout their Cheektowaga house. You can read their story here, or on page 29 of the current issue of the magazine, now on free newsstands across Buffalo and WNY.
Click photo for a complete slideshow.
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Issue 18: Living History
Posted on Thursday, March 11th, 2010
by block club
Living History
By Ben Siegel Photos by Steve Soroka
See this story in the magazine here.
More photos of Beth and Jason’s house can be seen in this slideshow.
Marilyn Rodgers doesn’t have to wonder what her walls would say if they could talk. Her historic 1820 cottage on Johnson Park in the West Village speaks to her regularly, exposing details of its former owners and past lives. If her house were a person, the walls would be its diary.
“The last owner, [Pat Wooley], fell in love with this house,” says Rodgers, who purchase it from Wooley’s estate in 1994. “She had an infatuation with the color yellow. There were yellow roses all through the backyard. The house was painted yellow with white trim. Every time we went to paint something over yellow, new paint would come through with yellow. We had to paint it three or four times.”
The recurring paint predicament revealed something to Rodgers about the house.
“Pat Wooley is still here,” says Rodgers. “She’s definitely still here.”
Spirits aside, the idea that a house can reveal its own legendary past––or that we may be open to receive its stories–– is not a ridiculous one to homeowners whose houses have long histories.
“I think more people believe that it’s your house today, and it’s your house for as long as you’re going to live there,” says Joe Saccone, a real estate agent at MJ Peterson who often deals with historic properties in Buffalo. “You’re basically the steward of that house for a period of time and then somebody else is going to take it down the road.”
These stories enlighten homeowners to the families and practices of eras past, but also educates them about its structural strength and integrity.
“Every house has a story, but you hope that people do the right thing with it, even though the next person might come in and completely change it around,” says Saccone.
Square one
When Chris Siano bought his Johnson Park home in 2005, he––like many new homeowners of older houses––wasn’t prepared for the financial and time constraints a renovation project would ensue. His 1857 house, just doors down from friend and neighbor Rodgers, would require significant structural repair and cosmetic renovation. The house was but a shell of its original self.
Siano, educated in architecture at the University at Buffalo and currently employed in its art department, imagined what he might do with a 1,200-square-foot blank slate.
“It’s a small house so either it’s going to be good for two people or you’re going to cram too many rooms in,” says Siano, who had a more contemporary approach in mind for the 148-year-old house. “I made the rooms big, the staircase big, so it [would feel] like a big house when it’s really a little house.”
In 2008, after three years of renovation work, Siano moved into his home, his wife later joining him when they married. They hope to start a family there.
“It’s tiny but it’s nice. It’s enough that it’s comfortable,” says Siano. “It should never feel like a 1,200-square-foot house.”
Before cosmetic work could take place, the house needed major structural work. Floors were re-hung, a new, wide staircase was installed, and a support beam was replaced. A back deck was added and new windows were needed, but much of the work indoors was completed over time. The exterior remains untouched, as it was determined the bricks were too old to be stripped of their paint.
Still, work continues.
Siano’s modern re-imagining of his historic house is a far cry from what some might think of with textbook restoration, no matter whose standards of the term are considered. But when Siano took over the house (after rental tenants had vacated), it was clear that very few, if any, significant architectural elements were left intact. All that remained were the exterior walls and the roof. He did salvage a piece of molding, which he plans on re-producing.
“That was literally the only thing left,” he said.
But more important to Siano than moldings and decorative flourishes was the structure, which had remained intact for more than a century.
“I think good architecture is uncomplicated. Good architecture is going to be around in 100 years. The fact that this house is still here 150 years later, makes it good architecture,” he says, adding that his background in the field informed every purchasing decision.
“Because I studied architecture, I didn’t want to compromise on it. I’m unwilling to do a Home Depot job on it. I’m unwilling to just cover up the walls and let the next guy worry about it.”
Most of Siano’s money was spent on staple elements and not décor, which he keeps minimal. Good floors, windows and doors were important, even more so than the use of so-called “green” materials.
“I worked on a house that had bamboo floors. I appreciate that, yes they’re green, and yes [bamboo grows] fast. But there are 16 pieces of wood in a single strip of bamboo floor. Don’t tell me that’s going to last 150 years. All you have to do with this floor is scour it every so often and refinish it. It’ll be here for as long as you want. It’s red oak. It’s not the best red oak, but what’s more environmentally friendly: The floor that takes a little more to grow but will have an indefinite life span, or the floor that doesn’t take very long to grow but you’re going to tear up in 15 years?” says Siano.
He wishes consumers were better educated on the home-building and renovation industry, no matter the age of their property.
“How can you possibly––if you’re not versed in this stuff––make that decision? If I were somebody that didn’t know about flooring, I’d try to do the right thing,” says Siano. “It’s like with anything else. You have to be really knowledgeable or you’ll get screwed.”
With structural reinforcements made, and an adaptable forward-thinking aesthetic inside, Siano is happy to help the house see another day.
“Hopefully it will be here for another 150 years.”
Living in the past
Reliving the glory of a house’s original era can be challenging and rewarding, but as Beth Dauria and Jason Adamczyk can tell you, you don’t have to go too far back to get a taste of history.
A step into the couple’s 1957 Cheektowaga ranch, which they purchased last year, reveals a kind of restoration that has more to do with things and less to do with structure.
The ranch, part of a quiet neighborhood just east of the East Side of Buffalo, is an example of the post-war suburban boom which some point to as the beginning of the city’s end. But as this couple exhibits in their white-brick abode, respecting the region’s history means honoring more than just turn-of-the-century Victorian homes.
The couple’s late-’50s aesthetic is seen in practically every square inch of their house, from furniture to silverware to sofas to door knobs to window treatments to placemats to televisions to practically everything else two people would want to live with. Even their careers are ’50s-themed. Adams plays in the Toronto-based rockabilly band, The Royal Crowns. His girlfriend of 10 years, Beth, owns her own vintage handbag company, DungareeDolly.com.
For them, the mid-20th century was an era of simplicity in design and living. Their look reflects a marriage between “The Wonder Years” and “Edward Scissorhands,” where good, quality products with innovative design reigned supreme. This is not merely a trip down tchotchke lane.
“It’s a lifestyle,” says Dauria. “But I think a collector would come in and want a lot of our stuff. It’s just who we are. It’s not like a gimmick. A lot of people will do a ’50s kitchen and everything else [in the house will be] different. This is very cohesive. It just makes sense to us.”
The couple purchases vintage furniture and items from as close as the Clarence Antique Mall to as far as away as Albany, where they traveled to pick up their recently acquired maroon sofa. They found its owner on Craigslist and were happy to give it a new home.
“I always say, when people are hesitant to sell us something, ‘You’re not going to find a better home,’” says Adamczyk. His preference is for vintage finds, while Dauria will go with a reproduction––like their vintage-style green stove, with digital display in disguise––when necessary.
“I definitely like vintage stuff better, but if it’s a TV and I can get a new one and it’s in color…” says Dauria. “It’s good to mix the vintage stuff with the new, modern stuff of today. I like that collaboration.”
When settling into their new home, the couple looked beyond their things, though. A family-friendly environment was important, as was a neighborhood that valued a quieter, simpler lifestyle. The house came with many of the previous owners’ ’70s-era furniture, but required very little work besides removing carpeting and repainting.
“All the houses were well maintained, not just ours,” says Adamczyk of the neighborhood. “Everyone [here] takes pride in their homes. There’s a lot of new, younger families moving in, which is keeping that up. We plan on keeping our house up and living here and being happy forever.” Finding a house with original cabinetry and hardwood floors was important. What they found in this house was an authentic charm not usually intact today, such as the turquoise kitchen tiles.
“We really wanted something that was pretty unmolested,” says Adamczyk. “I wanted a lot of this stuff retained, because to go back to put it the way it was [originally], the way you think it should be, costs a fortune. So the more that you have to work with, the better. We came in here and there was enough to work with, and we could see past what was already updated.”
Though houses of the era lack the ornate details of a turn-of-the-century Victorian or Tudor––the typical image of an “historic” house––it’s the simplicity of functionality and form that give Dauria and Adamczyk a chance to connect with their house’s history.
“I want to come home and I want to get lost in a world. And I think people surround themselves with things that make them comfortable. Stuff from mid-century, it just makes us a lot more comfortable,” says Adamczyk. Dauria agrees. It’s become her life’s passion.
“I think a lot of this stuff give us some feeling. I think a lot of people will go to the store and pick something out and go, ‘Eh, I don’t know. I kind of like it.’ We don’t ‘kind of’ like anything. We love everything,” she says. “You definitely have to be passionate about everything in your home to make it everything you want it to be.”
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Issue 18: KnowWear
Posted on Thursday, March 11th, 2010
by block club
Park School student Caralyn Mirand made it all the way to the finals of the Fiercely Real model search on The Tyra Show. We sat down with Caralyn recently and discussed her real beauty, Tyra Banks and how a reality show is really made. You can read Caralyn’s interview (pg. 19) in the current issue of the magazine, now on free newsstands across Buffalo and WNY.
Click photo for a complete slideshow.
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Issue 18: Transforming Buffalo
Posted on Thursday, March 11th, 2010
by block club
A number of city buildings with various former lives are being transformed into residential or mixed-use spaces, from firehouses to schoolhouses. Take a look inside just a few of them here. You can see more of this story on page 37 of the current issue of the magazine, now on free newsstands across Buffalo and WNY.
Click photo for a complete slideshow.
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Les Misérables: At least we’re not literally blue
Posted on Thursday, February 18th, 2010
by bunjamin
The Avatars are invading St. Louis. They should get a pass for this fact alone.
Ughhh. I don’t know what to say when I see articles like this. To be defensive borders on whiney, and to play devil’s advocate seems redundant. Furthermore, what the people in the Forbes Empire––Forbania, east of Decatur I think––don’t know about Buffalo could fill pages, no volumes, of magazines. But of course they won’t sell, so here we are again: Buffalo is a miserable city. No shit. That’s because people like this goofy man keep telling us we’re miserable. (And guess what? He’s not so pretty either.)
What I find interesting about this “article”––the shallowness of which a gnat couldn’t swim in––is that the cities on this list of 20 “most miserable” in the United States are called out for the same few repeating reasons. Miami and Kansas City have crime? You don’t say, Columbo. Detroit and Buffalo, a half-century after their industrial foundations’ demises, are still trying on new hats to wear? Well I’ll be…
I hate to take sides here, especially as being combative and defensive just won’t help matters. But what do these rankings really tell anybody about these 20 cities which we didn’t already know about them? I’ve never been to Stockton, Calif., and I know I’m going to get shot there. Probably while outside cleaning up a highway with a group of orphaned puppies, too. And Cleveland? Yeah, I’ve never put that on my “Where Should I Summer This Summer?” bucket list. But that doesn’t mean I don’t want to learn more about these towns, if for no other reason than to confirm what I suspect about them. Maybe I’ll be surprised to find something that doesn’t make me miserable being in their presence. Just like how people learn things about Buffalo, like that we’re cold and warm at the same time, and that we invented the single best appetizer besides Doritos.
It’s such an arbitrary classification to say a town is miserable, which as far as I last checked was a subjective distinction. Might as well have been Most Reasonably Unsatisfactory Cities-in-Decline, Depending on the Day, and Neighborhood, and Who You Ask and Whether or Not the Sun Was Out at the Time. Then at least we’d know that somebody had thought these entries through. And by somebody I don’t mean a room of monkeys.
I would tell you to look through Forbes’s list, but you’ll just be reading the same few labels over and over, mainly that sports teams make sad citizens, especially in St. Louis, whose Rams have won 8% of their games in the last three years; and that 82% of the citizens of Canton, Ohio are technically stupid. Makes me feel better about not passing through. I might make them uncomfortable with all of my nuclear-physics babble. And Rockford, Ill? Cheer up, you lost the pennant but made Rosie a star!
One more: Ohio, you apparently are the suckiest pace on Earth, with not one but THREE entries on this list! Not even a Dakota ranked!
Miserable may be subjective, but with these hard facts, I might want to ask a few more people before I start traveling through these parts. I may not enjoy my time in Canton, Ohio any more than Cantonites apparently aren’t, but that’s good considering it sounds like they hate it.
I’ll be sure to pack my bullet-proof Uggs.
If this photo of a Cleveland bridge was taken in July, then I understand.
How can people in Memphis be miserable if they’re not even there?
This lady ruined Stockton.
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Posters & Programs: Nickel City Chef
Posted on Wednesday, February 17th, 2010
by block club
Nickel City Chef is a local series of cooking competitions modeled after the Food Network’s popular Iron Chef. The competition pits local chefs against each other in an hour-long three-course cook-off using a secret local ingredient that’s revealed only moments before the competition begins. Season two begins this Sunday, Feb. 21 and features Nickel City Chef Adam Goetz of Sample versus challenging chef Ross Warhol of the Chautauqua Institution’s Athenaeum Hotel.
Nickel City Chef creator Christa Glennie Seychew contacted Block Club to have us design a series of posters and programs to generate buzz and excitement for season two.
We decided to do what everyone’s parents told them not to do and play with our food. We created a series of collateral materials that featured the letters N-C-C formed out of chopped peppers, shredded carrots, crispy bacon and uncooked ground beef. “Seconds anyone?” was chosen as the tag line to announce the popular series’ second year.
Posters can been seen hanging in local businesses and restaurants around Buffalo and programs are available at each of the eight events. For those of you who have not attended a Nickel City Chef event before, get your tickets fast! Season two is almost sold out. More information about the competition, participating chefs and restaurants and how to buy tickets can be found here. Things are really starting to heat up in the Buffalo food scene. Bon appetit!
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Social Situations: Facebook Pages
Posted on Wednesday, February 17th, 2010
by block club
Chances are if you’re online, you’re on Facebook. If you’re not on Facebook, you’ve at least thought about signing up. Facebook started as an online tool for communication through user profiles, photos and shared interests, but has become a useful tool for businesses too.
To get your business on Facebook, you’ll want to create a “fan page.” (Not a “group” and not a personal “profile”; if you’re reported with either of these types of pages, Facebook could delete your profile.) Fan pages are great because they’re industry-specific. Include information about your business, such as hours, accepted payment, etc. After you’ve published your fan page you’ll want to suggest to your friends that they become fans by clicking on the “Suggest to Friends” option under your profile photo. Ask them to ask their friends to be fans as well and watch your list grow. Get people talking about your company by posting informative and/or quirky status updates. Those updates will show up on your fans’ homepages when they first login. Have contests, post links to articles written about your business, or include information that you think your fans will enjoy. If you feel you need one-on-one help setting up your business on Facebook, you can hire a Web designer or marketing specialist to help walk you through the process for an affordable price.
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Block Club Magazine: House & Home Issue
Posted on Wednesday, February 17th, 2010
by block club
When brainstorming this year’s House and Home Issue, we continued the conversation that we started two years ago with our first home-themed issue. In that issue (which, you might remember, featured two illustrated birds on the cover in their comfortable nest), we talked with local homeowners and renters about what made their houses/apartments/dorm rooms/houses of worship feel like their own. It was less about the house and more about the home. Last year’s issue focused on some design trends in the local home-building industry. That issue was decidedly more about the structure and aesthetics of a house.
This year we wanted to dig deeper into the discussion that is being had around the area about the renovation, rehabilitation and restoration of our many historical and architecturally significant homes. We have amazing resources in Buffalo, organizations which help to restore historic properties and save them from demolition; non-profits which salvage renewable architectural elements and fixtures from abandoned houses so that they may live on in other houses; and preservation boards which work to educate and inform of the efforts of local historians, builders and lawmakers.
We are so excited to share with you just a few stories of homeowners who have worked endlessly and tirelessly on breathing new life into their properties. For some, it is primarily an investment of time and money; for others, it is that and the desire to converse with history, learn about the past, and breathe new life into our city’s rich history. This issue is a wonderful conversation between what makes a house and what constitutes a home.
Look for the third annual House and Home Issue this March and April free at over 550 locations in WNY and online at BlockClubOnline.com.
