Today’s urban scene of the week (er, scene of the month?) brings us to 567 Exchange Street, an alluringly spare, rustic loft building at the banks of Buffalo’s most historic and longest-enduring rail line, the Buffalo & Attica, first built in 1843 and later subsumed into the New York Central rail empire that connected the city to New York, Chicago, and the vast reaches of the continent beyond.

The four-story structure was not constructed at this site in 1900 for no reason. The Buffalo Lounge Co., for which the building was erected, chose this precise location because of the geography of the Hydraulics at the intersection of several rail lines, including the Erie and New York Central. The Buffalo Lounge Co. was directly linked to both lines via a rail bed that once existed behind the building. Read the rest of this entry »

Consider yourselves now on the inside track! Hidden far within labyrinthine corridors of the “arts floor” (Floor 7) of the Seneca Industrial Center is a fabulous little lounge, replete with La-Z-Boy and card table. According to sources, this groovy space is hipster central at the Larkin District.

The small space, set aside for late-night chill time and crack-of-dawn cups o’ Joe, is like the sacred communal ground of the building’s so-called Arts Floor, home to a community of art studios, furniture manufacturers, and Buffalo’s leading set designers. Ugly chair + tall ceilings + exposed brick/concrete walls = Urban Cool. Read the rest of this entry »