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Looking out from the hills, Williamstown is a college town. It was founded with Williams College, one of the top liberal arts colleges in the country, and it has grown from from a farming communty along the Hoosic River to a center of the arts. The college and the town have grown together, and their relationship is often complex.
The college gives the town an energy. On a quiet night in late fall you can spend an evening with a folk musician from central India or an astronomer who can share a cider doughnut and a new theory on the nature of black holes.
A young visitor at the Williamstown Holiday Walk.
That energy has pull. It may be why you can find Frank Lloyd Wright’s influence in a brick storefront on Water Street. The Clark Art Institute and the Williams College Museum of Art bring artists who have exhibited around the world, and the Williamstown Theatre Festival has sent eight plays to New York just this year.
Around the college today, local businesses and small farms are growing with local support. You can taste local cheese at Cricket Creek or maple syrup at Ioka Valley Farm. And you can walk the trails along the Taconic Ridge, or through the fields of the Williamstown Rural Lands Foundation, or follow the Appalachian Trail across Mount Greylock and over the state line into the vast forests in Vermont.
Babak Tafti appears as Taroon in 'Selling Kabul' at Williamstown Theatre Festival. Photo by Joseph O'Malley.
A scenic design intern creates behind the scenes at Williamstown Theatre Festival. Photo by Daniel Rader.
In a Raisin in the Sun, Joshua Echebri and Nikiya Mathis share laughter and ambition at Williamstown Theatre Festival.
A reader sits on one of Louise Borgeois' giant glowing eye sculptures outside of the Williams College Museum of Art (with Goodrich Hall in the background).
The dance studio at the '62 Center at Williams College looks out at the mountains.
An image from Woven Roots Farm appears in Small Good Thing screened at Images Cinema in Williamstown. Press photo courtesy of Images Cinema
A student performs outdoors on Mountain Day at Williams College. Students celebrate a fall day with music and outdoor activities. Press image courtesy of Williams College
A student rappels from a college building on Mountain Day at Williams College. Students celebrate a fall day with music and outdoor activities.
Students try out a crosscut saw on Mountain Day at Williams College. Students celebrate a fall day with music and outdoor activities.
Maple trees turn along the Hoosic River.
A conservator at work in the Williamstown Art Conservation Center in the Clark's Lunder Center at Stone Hill.
New England Dance on Tour will come to the '62 Center at Williams College.
The Zambezi Marimba Band, Kusika, CoDa contemporary dance and Sankofa's step dancers will perform at Williams College.
Cindy Nikitas of Cindy's Cookin' Greek serves spanikopita at the Williamstown Farmers Market.
