Buildings Reborn: New Uses, Old Places

From press release:

"Architectural recycling is the subject of "Buildings Reborn: New Uses, Old Places," an exhibition using photographs and explanatory texts which will open at the Burchfield Center, Buffalo State College, 1300 Elmwood Ave., with a public reception, 2 to 5 p.m., Sunday, Dec. 9.

The exhibition, organized by Barbaralee Diamonstein under the auspices of the Gallery Association of New York State, analyzes 53 projects throughout the country in which old buildings have not only been preserved but also been adapted to uses different from their original purpose and more appropriate to contemporary needs. For example, in Albany the old Federal Building (1883-84), which once housed railroad stations and newspaper and federal offices, now is home to the central administration of the State University of New York. 

Similarly a foundry plant in Brooklyn is now a 532-bed teaching hospital and Hiram Sibley's 1868 Italianate mansion in Rochester is the corporate headquarters of the Schlegal Corporation.

By thus providing old buildings with a new economic and social life, contemporary planners and architects often have a salutary impact on neighborhoods and even larger areas. The exhibition reveals how designers deal in creative and functional ways with the problems of adapting the old structure to the new use within the constraints of the existing building. It also points out the social value of preserving the best of the past and thus saving diminishing resources in the context of productive present use."