Buffalo’s Delaware Park is the crown jewel of the park system in Western New York, designed by world-renowned landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted—the same man who designed New York City’s Central Park.
The 376-acre space encompasses much of the heart of the city and dominates the south end of the North Buffalo neighborhood. The park is broken into two sections, “Meadow Park” to the east and “Water Park.” It houses some of the most recognized cultural institutions in the city like the Buffalo Zoo, the Albright-Knox Art Gallery and the Buffalo History Museum.
There are a number of baseball fields, a golf
course, tennis courts and soccer fields within “Meadow Park” and the
second largest Shakespeare festival in the country (next to the one in
Central Park in New York City) takes place there every summer.
Delaware Park was the first of three parks designed by Olmsted in Buffalo and was constructed between 1868 and 1876.
Olmsted originally referred to the area as
simply ‘The Park,’ but the name was later changed due to its proximity
to Delaware Avenue, Buffalo’s millionaire row.
At
the turn of the century, Buffalo was the eighth largest city in the
country and had the most millionaires per capita than any other city.
Many of the 60 millionaires that lived in the city resided on Delaware
Avenue in one of the many mansions that lined the street. Today, many
of those grandiose manors still exist, but some have been lost to the
urban destruction that became popular in the 1950s and 1960s.Delaware Park is also (or was also) home to a secret garden that sat just outside of the front doors of the Parkside Lodge.
The Quarry Garden as it was called by Olmsted,
showcased stone arch bridges and reflective pools but was filled in when
the Scajaquada Expressway was built. The Buffalo Olmsted Parks Conservancy has expressed their commitment to unearthing this hidden treasure.
While
some beautiful details of the park have been lost during the rampant
development of the past century that catered to cars over walkable
spaces, the conservancy has done a wonderful job of retaining so much
character of the area.
Nearly every corner of the park holds a
beautiful space worth exploring. Hoyt Lake, the rose garden, Marcy
Casino, the Japanese Gardens, the ivy bridge and Forest Lawn Cemetery
(this may sound morbid, but the area is breathtaking), are stunning
examples of the vision that Olmsted had for our city.
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