Allentown has always been jampacked with artists. But for much of its history, aside from two days each June when the Allentown Art Festival blows through Delaware Avenue like a tempest of wind chimes and Sunday pastels, the city’s nerve center of eccentric artistry has suffered from an improbable shortage of actual art spaces.

That is, until now. For the past decade, Allentown has been undergoing a slow metamorphosis. Its status as a quirky collection of scattered art and retail spaces has lately given way to a more united and self-assured neighborhood poised to identity itself as a destination for buyers, aficionados and casual fans of visual art.

“It was kind of operating on an individual basis previously,” said Ed Castine, a member of the Allentown Association, which is working to brand the neighborhood as a gallery district and arts destination. “What’s different now is people are starting to band together a little bitThere were little pockets, but now those pockets are starting to talk to each other more. I think art has become pervasive throughout the whole neighborhood.”

Not to mention more plentiful.

Allen Street, the neighborhood’s congested main drag, now boasts 10 art spaces in the space of 10 compressed blocks from Main to Wadsworth. And if you venture up to North Street or down to Tupper, that number increases significantly.

On the east side of Allen Street between Main Street and Delaware Avenue, galleries like El Museo Francisco Oller y Diego Rivera and Buffalo Big Print were joined recently by Studio Hart, a jewelry and fine art gallery; Indigo Art, a purely commercial art space; and Hero, a design shop and boutique.

On the west side, College Street Gallery, a neighborhood staple since 1997, has been joined by the alternative arts collective Sugar City. Around the corner on Elmwood Avenue are B West Studio and the Gateway Gallery, along with a smattering of art spaces with irregular hours and sporadic shows. On North Street, there’s the vaunted Nina Freudenheim Gallery, and on Main Street, the Artspace Lofts, which houses dozens of artists and a gallery of its own.

A district emerges

As far back as anyone’s cultural memory stretches, no period in Buffalo’s history ever boasted a bona fide gallery district, a simple stretch of sidewalk where one could while away an entire day meandering from one gallery to the next in a lazy search for beauty.

In 1989, when longtime gallery director and dealer Nina Freudenheim moved her eponymous gallery from its home in Allentown to a refurbished seed factory on Niagara Street, she made a telling remark about the likelihood that patrons would visit the new space.

“I’m confident people will come,” she said. “After all, there is no art district in Buffalo.”

Twenty years later, even in the midst of an economic crisis, Buffalo has at last produced what promises to be a gallery district of significant allure. (Farther north, the recently christened “Museum District” is emerging, centered around the Albright- Knox Art Gallery and Burchfield Penney Art Center.)

Today, Freudenheim’s gallery, once again safely ensconced in the boundaries of Allentown, is the crown jewel of the area’s eclectic gallery scene, which seems to grow larger by the year.

“There’s no question that art is making an impact on Allen Street,” Freudenheim said. “And it’s about time.”

Recognizing that the Allentown gallery scene had finally reached critical mass, gallery owners Elisabeth Samuels of Indigo Art, Dan and Barbara Hart of Studio Hart and Dale Schwalenberg of Buffalo Print sat down over coffee to brainstorm a way to take advantage of the situation.

With the help of the Allentown Association, they came up with an event called “First Fridays,” during which neighborhood galleries and businesses would promote Allentown’s offerings for a few hours on the first Friday night of every month.

The nascent neighborhood event, which drew large crowds during its inaugural deployment in May, aims to promote the area around Allen Street in the mold of bustling arts districts in larger cities. For inspiration, gallery and business owners are looking to Toronto’s Distillery District, Columbus, Ohio’s, Short North neighborhood, and Chicago’s Bucktown –all initiatives in which artists and art spaces have successfully anchored retail development and neighborhood revitalizations.

‘Gallery crawl’

The next “First Fridays” event, which reflects the normal summer lull in arts activities, is slated for Aug. 7. About eight galleries and two dozen Allentown businesses will open their doors for a “gallery crawl” from around 6 to 8 p. m.

This gallery boom marks a sea change from even a decade ago, when a tour of more than three or four of the city’s commercial galleries would no doubt have required a car.

Freudenheim noted that most of the galleries on Allen Street are not purely art spaces. Most have some kind of mixed-use function, like Sugar City’s doubling as a performance space, or Studio Hart’s dual use as a jewelry and fine art gallery.

“It’s healthy. It’s not a straight-ahead commercial gallery scene,” Freudenheim said, noting that while Allentown at large has been undergoing a renaissance for quite a while, Allen Street itself had until recently been insulated from the revitalization taking place elsewhere.

For Barbara Hart, whether Allentown’s scene is full of white-walled commercial spaces or, as it is now, a unique amalgam of art/retail spaces, now is the time to take advantage of the neighborhood’s bounty of galleries and the public’s obvious desire to patronize them. She pointed to the “Gallery Hop” in Columbus, Ohio, as a sign of where Allentown’s efforts to promote itself could lead.

“It’s a very long walk with something every step of the way to look at,” Hart said of the Columbus event. “There’s a lot of cities that do it, but I think our hope is just to get people into Allentown. And since there are so many galleries here right now, it seems like a logical step forward.”

The Allentown gallery scene has reached critical mass. Clip out this map and take it along to guide your explorations through the neighborhood’s growing variety of arts spaces. From the glamour of Nina Freudenheim Gallery to the gritty neighborhood flavor at the College Street Gallery, a short walk on the streets of Allentown is likely to surprise your senses.

1. Cosmopolitan Gallery, 928 Main St. 650-4022. This rustic space at the corner of Main and Allen streets hosts occasional exhibitions of off-beat work from local painters, illustrators, sculptors and comic book artists. Nothing’s up at the moment, but keep an eye out for the gallery’s sporadic shows, which tend to come and go with little fanfare.

2. Studio Hart, 65 Allen St. 536-8337. Since opening in 2006, this small gallery operated by Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra Executive Director Dan Hart and his wife, jewelry artist Barbara Hart, the charming but cramped gallery space has hosted a series of well-received shows from established and mid-career artists. Right now: “Only the Stones Remain: Kayaking on the Buffalo River,” photographs by Ed Healy. Through Aug. 15.

3. Indigo Art, 74 Allen St. 984-9572. Directly across the street from Studio Hart, Indigo is a project of local dealer Elisabeth Samuels, who recently decamped from her former home in the Elmwood Village to the less expensive environs of Allentown. Samuels’ space is a showcase for established artists, largely women, who work in photography, oil painting, watercolor, sculpture and mixed media. Right now: “Summer in the City,” a group show. Through Aug. 2. Next up: “Grey Dreams II: Works on Paper by Jeffrey Vincent.” Aug. 7 to 30.

4. Buffalo Big Print, 78 Allen St. 884-1777. Not an art gallery in the traditional sense, Buffalo Big Print nonetheless promotes established local artists (Ben Perrone, Adele Cohen, Gene Witkowski) by offering large-scale, high-quality (and pretty pricey) prints of their work. Next up: A group show of local artists, Aug. 7 to 28

5. Hero Design Studio, 93 Allen St. 858-4376. More design boutique than art gallery, the hip outfit Hero began operations in 2001 and now runs a gallery and boutique to exhibit and sell its work, along with specialty toy products. Right now: a selection of poster prints and products from far-flung locations.

6. El Museo Diego Oller y Diego Rivera, 91 Allen St. 884-9362. Founded by Craig Centrie in the ’70s, El Museo has long exhibited work by prominent local artists from the Latino, African American and gay communities, and served as a venue in the most recent incarnation of “Beyond/In Western New York.” Right now: “Botanicus Photographica,” a group photo exhibition, through Aug. 1.

7. Rust Belt Books, 202 Allen St. 885-9535. On top of the dusty stacks of poetry and literature, this neighborhood favorite hosts performances and monthly art exhibitions. Eclectic and neighborhood-focused are the operative words at Rust Belt, which closes a show of paintings by Peter Fowler today. Next up: Work by Sandra Ludwig.

8. Gateway Gallery, 141 Elmwood Ave. 886-6888. This large, warehouse-like gallery recently hosted a series of fascinating exhibitions of work by Niagara Falls artist Jonathan Rogers. It’s also well-suited to live music, as an April concert dedicated to the life and art of Mark Freeland proved. Next up: A variety of exhibitions as part of the Buffalo Infringement Festival. Visit www.infringebuffalo.org for more information.

9. BWest Studio, 148 Elmwood Ave. 480-2074. This small space hosts an eclectic array of art exhibitions, often as fund-raisers for local social work organizations. Next up: A variety of exhibitions as part of the Buffalo Infringement Festival. Visit www.infringebuffalo.org for more information.

10. The Space@224 Allen St. 628-4223. An adjunct to the local design firm JR Visuals, The Space has hosts a variety of shows, many design-oriented and others that play off local festivals like the Allentown Art Festival and the ongoing Infringement Festival. Next up: A variety of exhibitions as part of the Buffalo Infringement Festival. Visit www.infringebuffalo.org for more information.

11. College Street Gallery, 244 Allen St. 856-2839. One of two galleries operated by local photographer Michael Mulley, this small white-box space has integrated itself into the neighborhood’s character just as much as the Old Pink, Rust Belt Books or Mulligan’s Brick Bar. The shows feature up-and-coming artists, often fresh out of school, and particularly festive openings. Right now: “College Street Gallery Co-op Jury Exhibit” through Aug 1.

12. Sugar City, 19 Wadsworth St. Launched by a group of 20-some-things who were sick of holding art shows in their attics and rock concerts in their basements, Sugar City is a multidisciplinary venue that hosts art exhibitions and concerts side by side. Next up: A variety of exhibitions as part of the Buffalo Infringement Festival. Visit www.infringebuffalo.org for more information.

13. Nina Freudenheim Gallery, 140 North St. 882-5777. Far and away Buffalo’s most respected and longest-tenured commercial gallery, this space tucked inside the historic Lenox Hotel on North Street exhibits the area’s top-tier artists, as well as New York-based artists with local ties. It’s a no-frills space, all the better to focus on the often incredible work hung on the walls.

14. C. G. Jung Gallery, 408 Franklin St. 854-7457 or www.apswny.com. As home base for the Analytical Society of Western New York, this is probably the last place you’d expect to see a fine art exhibition. But the center has recently begun hosting art shows on a regular basis. Next up: “Together,” watercolors and photographs by Caroline and Tim Hailand. Aug. 2 through Sept. 7.

– Colin Dabkowski