Robert
Coles - Table of Contents
Robert T. Coles
Partial reprint Erie
County Has Always Been Home to Black Excellence - Robert T.
Coles By
Charles Skowronski
Buffalo Rising, February 22, 2022 In a combined research and design thesis, Coles created an urban renewal project for the neighborhood in which he had attended high school. Titled “Community Facilities in Redevelopment Areas, A Study and Proposal for the Ellicott District in Buffalo, New York,” the project was created with the Buffalo Urban League as the client. Coles’ thesis reached a receptive audience in Western New York and was widely publicized in Buffalo. While at MIT, he would be the first African American to be awarded the Rotch Traveling Scholarship, which allowed him to travel to Europe. After working for such prestigious firms as Shepley, Bulfinch, Richardson, Carl Koch and Associates and Techbuilt, Coles would return to Buffalo to open his own practice in 1963. Coles would get the opportunity to put his thesis to work when
he was commissioned to create the Ellicott District Recreation
Center, known today as the John F. Kennedy Recreation Center.
During construction of the recreation center, Coles worked as
coordinating architect with the firm of DeLeuw, Cather and
Brill. Following the completion of the project in 1963, Coles
established his own architectural firm, Robert Traynham Coles,
Architect pc. Still in operation in 2011, Coles’s practice is
the oldest African American owned architectural firm in New
York State and in the Northeast. Coles’ career would focus on
community engagement while pursuing diversity, inclusion and
equity in his work. He would continue to be an outspoken
critic in the field of architecture, advocating for better
equity and opportunities for both women and minorities. When UB was reviewing where to build its new campus, Coles
advocated for it to be built downtown, along the waterfront,
citing the downtown campus would be more convenient for the
city’s lower-income inner-city residents, who could not afford
to commute to the northern suburbs. His firm would later be
commissioned to build Alumni Arena on the new North Campus. Robert T. Coles passed away on May 16, 2020 at the age of 90.
In 2021, it was announced that the Utica Station would be
renamed in his honor. His house and studio were listed on the
National
Register of Historic Places in 2011. |