Mass MoCA is now the largest contemporary art museum in the country, and one of the largest on the planet. Artists from across the U.S. and the world have come to show their work in a former mill North Adams along the Hoosic River.
READ MOREMassachusetts’ smallest city is going through a revival. A milltown for generations at the foot of the state’s highest peak has grown gradually into the home of the country’s largest contemporary art museum.
Mass MoCA opened in the old Sprague Electric mill complex 20 years ago, and the museum has kept on expanding in art and performance, until it brings tens of thousands of people to Wilco’s Solid Sound festival every other year in June, and the FreshGrass folk festival in September and contemporary music with Bang on a Can in July.
Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts holds its own concerts and art exhibits throughout the downtown and partnerships with creative nonprofits up and down the county. And the community is joining in.
Entrepreneurs and artists are re-inventing the mills. The Norad Mill has become a marketplace of local shops and studios. The Eclipse Mill houses sunlit artists lofts, with a gallery and bookstore, and along Route 2 GreylockWorks holds artisan markets and community dance parties.
Outside of downtown, the mountains draw people in. Hikers climb the Appalachian Trail and up Mount Greylock to the WPA lodge and the lighthouse at the summit. And train enthusiasts come to admire the Hoosac Tunnel and ride the historic railway, and look north to Adams and the Ashuwillticook Rail Trail.
North Adams
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Bear and Bee Bookshop
North Adams, MA
Jennifer Stevens and Rye Howard took the leap of opening a bookshop in a pandemic, with focuses in science fiction and fantasy, health and the land and more.
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Plant Connector
North Adams, MA
Boston ferns hang overhead, trailing long green fronds, and tiny begonias sit in the window … The Plant Connector is a warm, bright space, and it’s vividly green.
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Tunnel City Coffee
Williamstown, MA
A college hangout and an anchor on Spring Street for decades, Tunnel City roasts its own coffee and has a loyal following — it roasts its own blends locally in the renovated Norad Mill in North Adams.
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Norad Mill
North Adams, MA
Moresi & Associates has drawn more than 40 local businesses to the renovated Norad Mill — artists and artisans, coffee and local wines, vintage records, yarn shops and even rocks and minerals.
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Mount Greylock summit
Adams, MA
At the top of Mount Greylock you can stand on the highest point in Massachusetts, 3,491 feet above sea level, with a lighthouse at your shoulder and a 1930s WPA lodge.
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Hoosac Valley Line
On weekends, Berkshire Scenic Railway runs hour-long, round-trip historic train rides between Adams and North Adams, and local volunteers tell the story of trains in the mountains.
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Public Eat + Drink
North Adams, MA
Public Eat + Drink is the kind of place that has purple potato chips on the menu, and homemade ice cream sandwiches — and local hamburgers so thick they can last for two meals. It’s the kind of place that will be crowded to spilling over at 5 p.m. on a Wednesday in a soaking rain. The word has gotten out.
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Brewhaha
Up at Brewhaha, Barry Garton smiles when he hears about the farm-to-table movement as a new phenomenon, because he has been cooking that way since the 1970s — local and homestyle, with fair trade coffee, soups and omelettes and his signature muffins — pumpkin chip, chocolate banana and more.
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HiLo North Adams
North Adams, MA
HiLo is a live music venue along the Hoosic River, just east of downtown. A couple of North Adams entrepreneurs have quietly turned the former Quinn’s paint store into an informal stage for comedy, folk and acousitc music, rock and R&B and more.
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North Berkshire dance
Contra and square dancing is a living New England tradition, as casual as dancing barefoot in the kitchen on a summer night. The North Berkshire Community Dance holds a monthly dance on second Saturdays at the Williamstown Community Preschool, with live music.
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GreylockWorks
North Adams, MA
Karla Rothstein and Salvatore Perry have renovated a 240,000 cotton mill on Route 2 near the North Adams / Williamstown line into GreylockWorks, a center for local food and events.
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