English: Vintage Flats Apartments, 315 Grote Street, Buffalo, New York, February 2023. Built about 1921 to a design by an unknown architect, this two-story, 33,000-square-foot, U-shaped former factory building is a fine example of the era's industrial architecture. Composed of two identical three-bay wings that sport separate entrances and are connected by a single-story brick walkway, the exterior is faced in a combination of brick and tile and is perforated by enormous multi-light windows that bathe the interior spaces in natural light in accordance with the Daylight Factory design philosophy. The open floor plan of the interior, with ceilings supported by stout wooden pillars, remained intact as of the filing of its Resource Evaluation with the New York State Department of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation in 2020, though that is presumably no longer true today given the conversion of the building to apartments. The building was constructed as home to the Visco-Meter Corporation, the inventor and manufacturer of a proprietary device that measured oil viscosity in automobiles, which remained its principal occupant until the late 1950s. Throughout its tenure at 315 Grote, Visco-Meter also leased out portions of the space to smaller concerns, most of which were also connected in some way to the automotive industry, a sector that was coming to prominence in the local area at the time: other businesses headquartered here include the Upholstered Construction Conpany (1923-1927), which as the name implies provided upholstery for automobiles, incinerator manufacturer Kellogg Mann (1929-1933), and the Buerk Tool Company, a manufacturer of precision machine parts, tools and fixtures for the automobile, aerospace and military sectors that moved their operations from Pearl Street in 1934, purchased the building outright after the departure of Visco-Meter, and remained there until the company's 2019 bankruptcy. The building was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2022 due to its significance to Buffalo's industrial architecture and history. As of when this photograph was taken, work was wrapping up on McGuire Development's $6.5 million conversion of the building to the Vintage Flats, a 33-unit complex of loft apartments where - uniquely - much of the machinery and paraphernalia that remained in the building from the Buerk days, such as load-lifter cranes, line-shaft equipment, and an old time clock, have been repurposed into decorative elements.