The wait is over. At long last, Farmer Pirates has announced its intentions to convert HSBC Tower’s 1.2 million square feet of office space into floors housing a greenhouse. According to a spokesman for the Farmer Pirates, Robert Galbraith, a deal is being presented* and the cooperative will be moving forward with its intentions to occupy and plant the interior and exterior of the building, so that it will become a true living structure. “Everyone knows that space is at a premium in Buffalo,” said Galbraith. “Vertical growing is the future of urban agriculture, and what better place is there than the city’s tallest building?”
The premise behind the move is to create a year ’round growing center.
*The deal that Farmer Pirates has in mind is fairly simple. The cooperative is asking that building owner, Seneca One Realty, donate the building free and clear. Seeing that this is an extremely good cause and exciting project for Buffalo, Farmer Pirates is counting on the transaction to move forward in coming weeks. In order for that to happen Farmer Pirates is asking the mortgage holder to forgive the $75 million due in January 2015. “In the alternative [to the building being donated], we plan to crowdsource the funding,” said Galbraith. “We successfully raised $15,000 in our Kickstarter campaign last year and it’s not a stretch to say we can repeat that. The people of Buffalo are tremendous supporters of urban agriculture and we should have absolutely no problem raising the necessary funds through small donations.”