Buffalo Arts and Crafts Conference to be October 20-22

Entitled “Frank Lloyd Wright and the Buffalo School of Arts and Crafts,” this international conference will zero in on how and why the Buffalo region became the national capital for design, production and innovation in American Arts and Crafts.  It will be held October 20-22 at the Edmund B. Hayes Hall on the campus of the University at Buffalo (NY).

With the region’s wealth of Frank Lloyd Wright buildings, The Roycroft Campus (coppersmiths seen above), Charles Rohlfs, The Larkin Company, Buffalo Pottery, The Arts and Crafts Shop, Stickley, Heintz Art Metal, Adelaide Robineau, Karl Kipp, Walrath Pottery and so many others, no other region of the country can claim the density of local production. In contrast to the British variant, many members of this Buffalo School of Arts and Crafts freely used the region’s technological prowess to achieve a seamless melding of industrial techniques and handcrafted design, detail and quality—the signature of American Arts and Crafts. This conference will examine how and why.

Bruce Austin: “Widescreen: Expanding the Research Agenda for Arts & Crafts.”

Cathleen A. Baker:  “Roycrofter Dard Hunter: Bringing the Viennese Secession to American Arts & Crafts Design.”

Thomas A. Guiler:  “Organized as a corporation, but work together as a Community”: Elbert Hubbard’s Roycroft and the Commercialization of the Arts and Crafts Utopia”

Henry Hull:  “Producing an American Arts and Crafts: The Designs of the Heintz Art Metal Shop of Buffalo, New York”

John Murphy:  “American Arts & Crafts: Socialist or Capitalist?”

Christine Schnaithmann: “The Larkin Administration Building’s Resonance in the Development of German Modernism”

Lisa Schrenk: “The Impact of Buffalo and the Martin Brothers on Frank Lloyd Wright’s Oak Park Studio.”

Bo Sullivan: “Decoding the Arts & Crafts Vignettes of the Birge Books, 1904‐1918.”

Jack Quinan: “The Larkin Building and Wright’s Oeuvre.”

Martin Wachadlo: “The Architecture of Esenwein & Johnson: Arts and Crafts and Art Nouveau.”

Catherine W. Zipf:  “To the Best of Her Ability”: Literature, Feminism, and the Arts and Crafts Movement in Western New York.”

During the catered lunch (vegetarian food provided), the noted Roycroft scholar and collector Boice Lydell will offer an illustrated tour of Roycroft’s production pulled from his own collection, the finest in the world.

Registration will include the Friday evening reception at the Roycroft Inn and entrance to the conference Saturday and Sunday. Cost for early bird registration* is $80 through October 6th, after which the cost is $140 (tour cost remains the same). An optional tour of local Arts and Crafts landmarks will take place Sunday afternoon for an additional $80.

Our tour of the Buffalo Arts and Crafts landmarks will begin at 12:30 with the Frank Lloyd Wright designed Darwin D. Martin House where scholar, Jack Quinan will guide us through the home. Next we will view the exterior of the Wright designed Walter Davidson House and proceed to the Burchfield Penney Art Center for a self-guided tour of the exhibition, “Wright, Roycroft, Stickley and Rohlfs: Defining the Buffalo School Arts & Crafts Aesthetic.” The tour will then proceed to a prime example of H.H. Richarsdon’s Romanesque revival style at the former Buffalo Psychiatric Hospital and Olmstead Complex, newly minted the Hotel Henry.

Following a tour of the facility, we will visit the exteriors of Wright’s Heath House and Kleinhan’s Music Hall designed by Eliel Saarinen. The tour will then visit Louis Sullivan’s Guaranty Building where we will be able to view the terra cotta ornamented exterior and the interior of the lobby. We will end the tour at the Larkin Center for Commerce and their exhibition on the Larkin Soap Company.

*Early bird pricing of $80.00 valid through October 6, 2017. Pricing for the conference will increase to $140 on October 7, 2017*

Please Register at: https://www.artsandcraftsalliance.org/registration/