The Ellicott Square Building is a historic office complex, completed in 1896, located in

Buffalo, New York Buffalo is the second-largest city in the U.S. state of New York (behind only New York City) and the seat of Erie County. It is at the eastern end of Lake Erie, at the head of the Niagara River, and is across the Canadian border from Sou ...

. It is found within the Joseph Ellicott Historic District.

History

The Ellicott Square Building was designed by Charles Atwood of D. H. Burnham & Company, and completed in May, 1896. At the time of its completion, it was the largest office building in the world. In 1896 and 1897, the building was the site of

Edisonia Hall Edisonia Hall was a generic name for exhibition halls that displayed the various inventions of Thomas Alva Edison's company. These included the phonograph, the Vitascope, the Kinetoscope and other such devices. The Edisonia Hall opened by Mitchel ...

and the Vitascope Theater, the earliest known dedicated motion picture theater in the world. At 10 stories high—with the capacity to support 10 more floors—and , the Ellicott Square Building was the largest office building in the world by floor area until 1908, with the opening of the

Hudson Terminal Hudson Terminal was a rapid transit station and office-tower complex in the Radio Row neighborhood of Lower Manhattan in New York City. Opened during 1908 and 1909, it was composed of a terminal station for the Hudson & Manhattan Railroad (H&M), ...

buildings in New York City. It was built at a cost of $3.5 million in less than one year. The building was named after

Joseph Ellicott Joseph Ellicott (November 1, 1760 in Bucks County, Pennsylvania – August 19, 1826 in New York City) was an American surveyor, city planner, land office agent, lawyer and politician of the Quaker faith. Life Ellicott was born in Bucks Co ...

, the planner and surveyor who laid out the then-village of Buffalo. The mantra of architect

Daniel Burnham Daniel Hudson Burnham (September 4, 1846 – June 1, 1912) was an American architect and urban designer. A proponent of the '' Beaux-Arts'' movement, he may have been, "the most successful power broker the American architectural profession has ...

was "make no little plans, they have no magic to stir men’s blood; think big." Built in the Italian Renaissance style, the exterior of the Ellicott Square Building is made of granite, iron, and

terra cotta Terracotta, terra cotta, or terra-cotta (; ; ), in its material sense as an earthenware substrate, is a clay-based unglazed or glazed ceramic where the fired body is porous. In applied art, craft, construction, and architecture, terracotta ...

with a veneer of pearl gray brick. The majestic interior courtyard contains a marble mosaic floor designed by

William Winthrop Kent William is a male given name of Germanic origin.Hanks, Hardcastle and Hodges, ''Oxford Dictionary of First Names'', Oxford University Press, 2nd edition, , p. 276. It became very popular in the English language after the Norman conquest of Engl ...

and James A. Johnson. Imported from Italy, the 23 million pieces of marble on the mosaic depict sun symbols from civilizations around the world. The interior court resembles that of the

Rookery Building The Rookery Building is a historic office building located at 209 South LaSalle Street in the Chicago Loop. Completed by architects Daniel Burnham and John Wellborn Root of Burnham and Root in 1888, it is considered one of their masterpiec ...

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

. There are broad stairs on either side and a glass roof in an ornamental steel frame provides natural light. The building features ornate glove lamps, intricate columns, carefully proportioned classical features gracing doorways, marble and brass to trim iron and stone. The beautiful lobby of the Ellicott Square Building remains a favorite gathering spot for political rallies, weddings and social functions. In 1984 it was used for hotel scenes in the movie ''

The Natural ''The Natural'' is a 1952 novel about baseball by Bernard Malamud, and is his debut novel. The story follows Roy Hobbs, a baseball prodigy whose career is sidetracked after being shot by a woman whose motivation remains mysterious. The story mo ...

''. The terracotta cornice was removed in 1971, and, soon thereafter, most of the forty lion heads on the exterior were also removed. The building is currently managed by Ellicott Development Co., the company founded and owned by Carl Paladino.Ellicott Square Building, 295 Main St., Buffalo
''Ellicott Development'' Web page. Retrieved June 4, 2014.

Notes

External links

Ellicott Square Building at Buffalo as an Architectural MuseumEllicott Square Building at Emporis.com
{{coord, 42.8822, -78.8750, type:landmark_region:US-NY, display=title Skyscraper office buildings in Buffalo, New York Office buildings completed in 1896 Tourist attractions in Buffalo, New York

History

See also

Notes

External links