Buffalo: America’s Best Planned City, is the latest short documentary by local film director John Paget, founder of Paget Films. It was premiered on Tuesday night at Larkin Square. I believe the film was prepared as a promotional piece for the CNU22 convention which will be held in Buffalo this June. CNU22 is the annual convention of the Congress for the New Urbanism. Here is what new-pat John Paget has to say about Buffalo on the film’s web site:
When I first came to Buffalo, NY from the West Coast, I was impressed by its design. Around every corner was an incredible piece of architecture or craftsmanship. Each morning, I bicycled past the ornate Lafayette High School, through the stately Colonial Circe and up Bidwell Parkway to caffé Aroma on Elmwood Avenue. The daily journey offered more than a jolt of caffeine; it provided the bolt of creative inspiration that can occur while rolling down a grand, tree-lined boulevard.Rust Belt cities have been kicked around a lot. As a filmmaker, I’ve always loved to tell the story of the misunderstood and maligned—the underdog. I yearned to make a film about my adopted hometown. The opportunity came with “Buffalo: This Place Matters,” produced for Visit Buffalo Niagara to highlight Buffalo’s architecture.
America’s greatest architects came and built their best works here. In return, Buffalo offered them the best canvas: oceanic waterfront vistas, elegant radial streets established by Joseph Ellicott, and the necklace of parks and parkways designed by Fredrick Law Olmsted. This visionary urban design led Olmsted—America’s greatest landscape architect—to call Buffalo, “the best planned city in America, if not the world.”Today, a new cadre of activists, entrepreneurs and innovators are living and working in Buffalo. With true Rust Belt grit, they’re rediscovering and restoring America’s “best designed” city. This film is dedicated to them.
One other thing. There is one clip in the film that relates to my recent story on St. Mary of Sorrows Church / King Urban Life Center. The former church actually shows up in a few segments, but one in particular illustrates a point I often try to convey. This one of segment shows a view of the Martin Luther King Park wading pool filled with kids in the foreground with the magnificent church tower in the distance. That tower in the distance is what architecture is all about. Architecture, true architecture, is about more than one building. It is about the city and its urbanism. It is about the interaction of the public and private realm. The architecture of the church building is gorgeous in and of itself and its use is once again serves an important institution in the city, but it is also part of the architecture of the park and of the neighborhood. That is true architectural power. When we throw these things in the trash we need to seriously think about everything that we are tossing off as worthless and have an understanding of what is really being thrown away as worthless. These things are special and they don’t ever come back once they are destroyed.
The story of Buffalo, New York’s world-class urban design and how today’s generation is rediscovering and restoring ‘America’s Best Designed City.’
Produced / Directed by John Paget, Paget Films
Executive Producers – Dottie Gallagher Cohen & Ed Healy, Visit Buffalo Niagara
Presented & Sponsored by
Visit Buffalo Niagara, Larkin Square, Buffalo Niagara Enterprise, Houghton College, Erie Canal Harbor Development Corp., The John R. Oishei Foundation, The Campaign for Greater Buffalo and Block Club.
Visit the official website to learn more:
www.bestdesignedcity.com