Project aims to preserve, share legacy of Black architect, activist Robert T. Coles

To Albert Chao, it’s a house of stories — stories of a Black architect whose work isn’t celebrated enough. Chao should know. He had never heard of Robert Traynham Coles until he moved into Coles’ unique home and studio on Humboldt Parkway in Buffalo’s historic Hamlin Park neighborhood in 2020 after moving back from Brooklyn.

Living in the space where Coles both lived and worked has given Chao, an adjunct instructor in the School of Architecture and Planning, plenty of time to learn more about Coles’ contributions to the profession. Chao has since learned about Coles’ work as both an activist and an architect who championed racial diversity within the discipline, and how he hired women and Black architects at his eponymous firm, providing them opportunities at a time when it was difficult to find jobs in the field due to racism and sexism. Coles died in 2020 at age 90.

Chao has big plans to ensure that Coles’ story is told to future architects and the wider world. He’s working with Scott Ruff, a Buffalo native and adjunct associate professor of architecture at the Pratt Institute, to preserve the building, renowned as a signature example of mid-century modern residential architecture, and create a community gathering space. Together, they hope to “bring social justice to Buffalo’s East Side to model and inspire design, preservation and conservation that brings investment, health and well-being.”

The Mellon Foundation awarded their nonprofit organization, Coles House Project, $150,000 in late 2023 to jumpstart the effort. With the support of a state grant from New York State Sen. Sean Ryan in February, they have also raised the funds to buy the property, the first step in embarking upon their vision of continuing Coles’ legacy.

“Our approach begins first by recognizing the harm that design, architecture and planning have had on marginalized communities in Buffalo’s East Side,” the group states on the Coles House Project website. “Through design, we then seek to challenge, resist, dismantle and restructure processes that contribute to systemic injustices by uplifting and supporting communities that have been marginalized by extractive practices and policies.”

Chao has been engaging his Hamlin Park neighbors, as well as UB students and community partners, as he and Ruff think about the Coles House and Studio’s future and how the site can be used for exhibitions, workshops, tours and community gatherings.

“It feels like it’s all kind of happening at once, but it’s been brewing for a long time,” says Chao. “There’s momentum. And a big part of this work centers around this idea of how do we learn from the past to understand the present such that we can move forward into the future?”

To begin the restoration process and imagine its future life, Coles House Project has also received $150,000 in funding from the African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund — a program of the National Trust for Historic Preservation — and the Getty Foundation’s Conserving Black Modernism program. With this funding, Coles House Project has brought on New York City-based Simple Design Studio Architects, a firm that specializes in the preservation, adaptive reuse, repair and rehabilitation of existing buildings, to develop a historic structures report and a reuse plan to both restore and imagine the future of the space.

In tandem and lockstep with this work and to keep the momentum going, Coles House Project is inviting community members to a three-day event called “home” that will include walking tours to historical sites and community-centered storytelling. Scheduled for Nov. 7-9, “home” aims to ask how the Coles House Project can work with the community to move forward.

Last spring, Chao led a studio in which nine students from the School of Architecture and Planning took a deep dive into Coles’ work. They visited and studied eight of his buildings in Buffalo, including the Frank E. Merriweather Jr. Branch Library, the Jesse E. Nash Health Center and the JFK Community Center. Among his other works, Coles designed Alumni Arena on the North Campus.

Of course, the class spent considerable time inside of and discussing the Coles House and Studio and what makes it unique. Most notably, the home was built in 1961 amid construction of the Kensington Expressway, which removed the Olmsted-designed, tree-lined median along the parkway.

In designing his house, Coles drew upon his experience at Techbuilt, a company that built prefabricated homes. With a few major tweaks to the Techbuilt process, including reorienting the structural beams and incorporating a flat roof, Coles’ building layout consisted of two rectangular units arranged in an L shape.

Knowing that the highway would be right at his front door, Coles arranged the structure so that his studio was adjacent to the main road while the living space and bedrooms were positioned toward the back, looking out to a sculpture garden and courtyard. In contrast, many of the porches near the Coles house face the expressway. The Coles house was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2011.

“When I moved in and started talking to the neighbors and learning more about Coles and his work, it was like, how did I not know about him before” says Chao. “Ever since, it’s been this five-year journey of learning about him and his practice.”

He believes Coles’ work isn’t as widely studied because Buffalo’s architectural behemoths — notably, those designed by Frank Lloyd Wright and Louis Sullivan, especially the Martin House and the Guaranty Building, respectively — shine brightest.

But, says Chao, “The everyday is actually pretty important. If we can influence design on the everyday, like a prefab house or multiple houses and affordable housing, that could be quite powerful. Beautiful architecture doesn’t have to be the Martin House or this (Coles’) house.”

Chao is looking forward to furthering Coles’ legacy. “It’s been an honor to live here,” he says.