Mapping Places

Both Buffalo Architecture, 1816-1940 and Buffalo Architecture: A Guide are late manifestations of Hitchcock’s academic definition of international style architecture. This perspective was first outlined in his 1929 text Modern Architecture: Romanticism and Reintegration, which laid the groundwork for the famous “International Style” exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art in 1932. This exhibit, which Hitchcock co-curated with Philip Johnson, then founder of the Department of Architecture and Design within the museum, interpreted the best of European modernism as a new formalist style of building. Their formal interpretation of modern architecture, despite many critiques from the 1930s onward, has been consistently influential as a visual standard of appreciation for preservationists and the general public. This approach, however, has sidelined the many contributions of those who were not positioned to commission an architect but nonetheless helped shape the city of Buffalo.

The “Beyond Hitchcock” room attempts to revisit and revise the historical meaning of modern architecture for contemporary audiences. The map of Buffalo shows the limited geographical focus of Buffalo Architecture: A Guide. These buildings were limited to the major civic buildings of the past and the present that best represented the wealthy elite of the city. The second map of Buffalo’s East Side introduces sites designed or commissioned by African American architects, clients, and users to accommodate their modern way of life. Reclaiming this history requires us to challenge the largely formal definition of modern architecture as a style with a conception of architecture as placemaking and spatial occupation. This sociological definition emulates the principles outlined by modern writers such as Lewis Mumford and Catherine Bauer, who understood modern architecture as a space-making practice. Visual collages of a few select historic spaces illustrate the spatial complexity that African Americans brought to existing buildings on Buffalo’s East Side—a reality that was not always manifest in the style of building but nonetheless radically altered the social fabric of the city.

These graphics were produced by architecture students at the University at Buffalo, SUNY under the supervision of Charles L. Davis II, an Associate Professor of Architectural History and Criticism.