File:Building at 515-517 Main Street, Buffalo, New York - 20221118.jpg

English: Although it was built in 1912, an era when Neoclassical-style small office buildings such as this tended toward minimalist ornamentation (the so-called "Stripped Classical" style), the design of the building at 515-517 Main Street in downtown Buffalo, New York bucks that trend with what was described in National Register of Historic Places documentation as the most elaborately detailed façade in the locally-listed, NRHP-eligible 500 Block of Main Street Historic District. That source especially highlights the building's roofline, delineated consecutively by a metal cornice, dentil row, and fretwork in a Greek key motif, but note also the scroll brackets that crown the pilaster strips between the columns of recessed windows, as well as the foliate reliefs in the spandrel panels. All told, the building is one of the most impressive works of the local architecture firm of Colson & Hudson. The city's Bureau of Buildings issued a construction permit to local citizen John N. Smith in July 1911, and upon its completion seven months later the space was divided among several retail tenants: the initial ones were the Mose Cohen pawnshop and Mlle. Jewell's hair salon on the ground floor, and the G. H. Scott Portrait and Photography Studio above. However, by 1917, the building's entire ground floot space was home to Nan King Restaurant, one of the earliest Chinese eateries in Buffalo to cater to an upscale white clientele: throughout the restaurant's seven-year tenure at the location, ads in local papers enticed visitors to the playhouses of the nearby Theater District with "dainty luncheons, afternoon teas, hearty dinners", and "high-class entertainment" at one of the city's largest and most popular dance halls. Later occupants of note include the local branch of Feltman & Curme, a national chain of shoe stores (in business 1923-1934); the Canadian Trappers fur shop (1927-1937), the Mayfair Coffee Shop (1954-1962), and the downtown branch of local men's clothier Martin Ltd. (1959-1970). The space is currently shared by OSB Ciderworks and the Noble Root wine and liquor store. As seen in November 2022.