Buffalo, N.Y. (WBEN) - After Friday's forecast cooldown, this may be a perfect weekend to walk around several Buffalo neighborhoods to look at gardens.
GardenWalk Buffalo will have 300 gardens to view both Saturday and Sunday.
Laurie Ousley says it began in 1995 with a group of neighbors who, inspired by a similar event in Chicago, decided to open up their gardens for visitors.
"Part of the idea was to bring people into the city to show that the city was not a particularly frightening place, but it was actually really beautiful with friendly people, and great architecture and beautiful yards and gardens," said Ousley.
Some 28 years later, she says a few different events now take place from May until October through Gardens Buffalo Niagara.
GardenWalk Buffalo has three headquarters, and you can get a map at any one of them to give yourself a free self-guided tour.
"We have one at St. Mark's school in Parkside, one at Canisius High School on Delaware, and West Side Community Services on Vermont," Ousley said.
Ousley adds merchandise is also available for sale with proceeds going toward keeping the event free.
Ousley says walkers have different strategies every year at the GardenWalk.
"If there's a place that we've never seen before, we want to go and check that out. In 2019, when Parkside was new to GardenWalk Buffalo, people came to Parkside because they'd never seen our gardens. A lot of people haven't seen Parkside, but a lot of people, when they're brand new to the event, will start by going to clusters," noted Ousley.
However, she says because there are 300 gardens to check out, it's impossible to get them all in a single walk. Gardens are along Parkside, Elmwood Village, Allentown and the Lower West Side.
The walk is available Saturday and Sunday from 10am to 4pm.
