The great American architect Frank Lloyd Wright is most commonly associated with the Midwest—most notably, Chicago and his native Spring Green, Wisconsin. But there’s an exciting architectural trove of Wright’s work in a less expected destination: Buffalo, New York. And in 2017, the 150th anniversary of his birth, Buffalo hopes to officially put itself on top of every architecture lover’s list. The first step? A years-in-the-making $50 million restoration of the Darwin Martin House, Wright’s first significant commission as an architect outside of the Midwest. Now nearly complete, the house is the lynchpin of a five-site “All Wright, All Day” tour that aims to bring his fans to upstate New York and put Buffalo back on the map as a major design destination.

The Martin House’s story is also Buffalo’s story. Darwin Martin was an executive for the Larkin Soap Company, a Buffalo business that made a fortune by giving deals to customers who purchased their “factory to family” products in bulk—think of it as the forerunner for Costco—in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. At the time, Buffalo was the eighth largest city in America, with the highest number of per capita millionaires. Martin was one of them. He had an open mind, an interest in architecture and design, and a nearly unlimited budget, which made him the perfect partner for Wright, who had just left a prominent Chicago firm to strike out on his own and make a name for himself. Martin heard about Wright from his brother who lived in Chicago, and ultimately commissioned three buildings from the up-and-coming architect: his home, a smaller house for his sister on the same piece of property, and the Larkin company’s administration building. Years later, Wright would return to western New York to design the Martins’ summer home, Graycliff, on Lake Erie.

Wright’s vision was so overwhelming that he wanted to control even the tiniest details, from the rain gutters to the birdhouses. He designed a dress for Darwin’s wife, Isabelle, to wear, which he believed complemented the building.

Mary Roberts is the executive director of the Martin House. She grew up nearby, and her husband was raised in the very neighborhood the Martin House sits in. She has spent years devoting herself both to protecting one of Wright’s early masterpieces and to telling the story of the Martin family. “A lot of people don’t know as much about the Martin House as they do about other Wright houses like Fallingwater,” she tells Condé Nast Traveler. “This was the opportunity that spring-boarded [Wright] to national and international fame. It’s during the construction of the Martin estate that he travels to Japan for the first time," an experience that would influence Wright's work for decades to come. The project, which was completed in 1907, totaled 32,000 square feet of building space, much of which wasn’t in the original plan that Wright pitched his client: altogether, the complex consisted of six interconnected buildings, including the main house, servants’ quarters, carriage house, conservatory, and an open-air walkway that is one of the most visually striking (and most photographed) elements.

Any Frank Lloyd Wright fan would probably be able to pick the Martin House out on sight, even if there weren’t groups of gawkers standing in front of it. Its long, angular design is characteristic of Wright’s Prairie Style of architecture, and many of the features—use of indoor plants to make the house seem more at one with nature, low ceilings, and bands of decorative art glass, including the Wright-designed “Tree of Life” window, which remains one of the most popular Wright designs on Christmas tree ornaments, glass paperweights, and other souvenirs—all came to be known as Wright hallmarks. Wright’s vision was so overwhelming that he wanted to control even the tiniest details, from the rain gutters to the birdhouses. He even designed a dress for Darwin’s wife, Isabelle, to wear, which he believed complemented the building.