File:Glenny Building, Buffalo, New York - 20201209.jpg

English: The Glenny Building, 251 Main Street, Buffalo, New York, December 2020. Designed by architect Richard A. Waite, built in 1873, and substantially reconstructed after a 1905 fire, the Glenny Building (also known at various times in its history as the Stanton or Dennis Building) is the only surviving building in Buffalo with a façade made entirely out of cast iron: a material that was popular for a time in construction as an alternative to stone that was cheaper, yet also had more structural strength and allowed for larger windows and doors. At five stories, the Glenny was the largest and tallest building with a cast iron façade in the state outside of New York City at the time of its construction. Belonging to the Palazzo school of Italian Renaissance Revival architecture, one can see exquisite features in the design of the building such as a cornice with grooved brackets crowning each floor. Each successive story above the ground floor boasts ten bays of windows separated by a colonnade of ornate Corinthian columns; on the second and fourth floors the windows feature (respectively) elegant segmental and round arches. All of these elements were formed by pouring hot iron into a mold and allowing it to harden; after it cooled it was painted to resemble stone. Framing the façade are pilasters on each side made of brick and coated with painted sheet metal, and a painted sheet-metal cornice on top with decorative modillions beneath. The building's first owner was William Glenny (1818-1882), the Irish-born namesake owner of W. H. Glenny & Sons, a dealer in wholesale and retail crockery that was one of the largest businesses in the country at the time, with branch locations in every U.S. state and territory. Glenny's offices were housed in the building until about 1915, at which time it was subdivided and the space leased out to a variety of other firms. In 2014, the building was purchased by local developer Paul Kolkmeyer for conversion into apartments and ground-floor retail space, a project that was completed in 2016.