Boston, Massachusetts

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While this city is famous for once having thrown out its tea into the harbor water below, visiting breezy Boston is no throwaway trip! With our friends at Shepley Bulfinch, we explored a museum with missing paintings, checked out the oldest library in the US, toured some of the finest academic institutions, and literally stood in a globe. Join us as we stroll through Beantown’s charming streets and historic neighborhoods, and with a visit to the Green Monster, our Adventure was surely wicked.

Shhhhhh...

Let the city do the talkin'

Welcome to the Countway Library

A haven of many medical firsts

Central Park Lanes

Make sure to bring your embroidered bowling shirt and your mathematically gifted friend, for at these lanes, pin handling and scoring are charmingly old school. Founded by Angelo Vozzella in 1950, Central Park Lanes is home to candlepin bowling, a distinctly New England-style version of the game where the balls are small enough not to need holds and pins are set by hand. While home to a warm community, regulars are serious competitors, so make sure your manual scoring is on the mark!

10 Saratoga St, East Boston, MA 02128

Boston Athenaeum

This private library holds a multitude of historic resources and texts, but it’s an unfinished painting that is arguably the most important piece of its collection. In 1796, American President George Washington sat for a portrait with the renowned painter Gilbert Stuart, but the artist only completed his head to his shoulders, stopping there with the intention of making copies he could sell. Most Americans would recognize the portrait, as it was used to create Washington’s image on the $1 bill. Now known as “The Athaneum Portrait,” the painting is shared with the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C.

10-1/2 Beacon St, Boston, MA 02108

Brattle Book Shop

Buying your way into the 200-year-old legacy at one of the oldest bookshops in America isn’t as hard as one might think. While offering over 250,000 books, maps, prints, and tchotchkes, the star of this literary institution is its open-air lot, offering used books for bargain prices. Murals of famous authors like Toni Morrison and James Joyce watch over the outdoor area, and who the likes of which won’t be offended if you select another author’s works. Owned and run by the Gloss family since 1949, it’s the perfect place to pick up some reading material for your quintessential Boston moment on a bench in the Common.

9 West St, Boston, MA 02111

South Station

Once the busiest train station in the world, this corner commuter building is getting its groove back. After sitting empty for two decades in the late 20th Century, this historical landmark is back to serving its intended purpose as a beating transit heart of Boston, along with housing a mysterious plaque.

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Cambridge, MA 02139

Boch Wang Theater

Designed by Clarence Blackall and opened in 1925, this retro performance venue is the largest in New England, with 3,600 seats. It’s partly named after An Wang, who paid for the theater’s restoration back in the mid-1980s. At the time, Wang was the fifth richest American due to his forty patents and a wildly successful computing business he started over a garage in Boston’s South End. The initial investment in Wang’s company? $600. The philanthropic efforts of Wang, however, such as preserving this theatrical venue for the city, have been priceless.

270 Tremont St, Boston, MA 02116

Boston Public Library

If you were to get your first library card here, you’d be joining a long list of many other “firsts” associated with this venerated institution. Founded in 1848, the Boston Public Library is recognized as the first municipal library in the United States, was the first to allow patrons to borrow books from its shelves, and was even the first to have a “children’s room” among others. Completed in 1895, the Charles Follen McKim Central Library holds the rare and special collections of Boston’s library system, and where one can spend a few relaxing hours in the palatial Bates Hall reading room. As peaceful as it is beautiful to look at while studying or reading, you may even take your first public nap by accident.

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700 Boylston St, Boston, MA 02116

Christian Science Center Plaza

Built to compliment the domed First Church of Christ, Scientist (1906), this plaza was constructed not only for parishoners in mind but for the people of Boston. Designed by by Stu Dawson of Sasaki and Araldo Cossutta with I.M. Pei & Partners in 1968, it features the largest publicly accessible private open space in the city. It also includes a 686 foot-long pool and some large sprinklers to quench any temptation of jumping in said pool.

Massachusetts Ave and, Huntington Ave, Boston, MA 02115

Mapparium

Ever wondered what it would be like to jump into one of those rotating globes from your childhood classroom? This three-story structure answers any questions you might have. Opened to the public in 1935, the Mapparium is made up of 608 stained-glass panels depicting a Rand McNally map of the world at that time (it’s a lot of fun to spot the differences). Inspired by the spinning globe that once stood in the New York Daily News building, the colorful exhibit is not only trademarked but also works very well as a “whispering gallery” due to it’s shape and acoustics. Psst…hey…check out Czechoslovakia!

210 Massachusetts Ave, Boston, MA 02115

Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum

Home to one of the most elegant indoor courtyards in the world, this museum is also host to an infamous tale. On the cold evening of March 18th, 1990, the largest art heist in U.S. history took place right within these walls. Thirteen paintings were taken from their frames and are yet to return, memorialized by the empty frames where they once stood throughout the galleries. While this unfortunate event looms over the institution, there are still many visual moments in this building that will steal your breath away.

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25 Evans Way, Boston, MA 02115

Fenway Park

In 1911, John I. Taylor was looking for locations to build a new ballpark for his baseball team, the Boston Red Sox. Later that year, his father purchased more than 365,000 sq feet (33,900 sq meters) of land in the neighborhood of Fenway-Kenmore. Naming the stadium “Fenway Park,” Taylor claimed the name was inspired by the location, though some suggested it promoted his family’s company, Fenway Realty. Regardless of its namesake, the oldest stadium in Major League Baseball was born.

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4 Jersey St, Boston, MA 02215

Polaroid Building

In 1943, Boston inventor and scientist Edwin Land was travelling on vacation with his family in Santa Fe. After taking a photo, his daughter asked Land, “Why can’t I see the picture now?”. A world-altering idea was born, with Land’s Polaroid camera and instant film technology taking the photography world by storm throughout the 20th Century. While the American company is now gone, the technology has seen a renaissance in early 2000s, and the legendary Boston company’s old headquarters still holds the time for passerby. Or is it timing how fast one’s film is developing?

784 Memorial Drive in Cambridge, MA

Harvard University Stadium

Made up of 4,800 individual concrete slabs, Harvard’s football stadium wasn’t initially the site of much nighttime activity. Almost 104 years after the first game was played in this Greco-Roman-style arena, lights were installed in 2007, beginning a new tradition of Saturday night games. For a program that was one of the first participants in the game of American football in the 1870s, they were one of the last to install permanent lighting in their stadiums. Tradition is a powerful thing, though those Crimson helmets look pretty classy under the floodlights.

79 N Harvard St, Allston, MA 02134

The Harvard Museum of Natural History

The hundreds of flowers at this museum appear to grow out of their display cases—and there’s not one plant cell in them. The Ware Collection of Blaschka Glass Models of Plants (better known as the Glass Flowers) is a unique collection of 4,300 glass botanical models representing 780 plant species. Highly realistic, the pieces were created by a German father and son duo, Leopold and Rudolf Blaschka, in their Dresden studio from 1886 to 1936. Made at the behest of a Harvard professor frustrated by how pressed specimens lost the realistic three dimensional elements of plants, the Blaschka project was a groundbreaking achievement, and the exhibit still sees over 300,000 visitors annually.

P.S. Their gift shop has AWA’s stamp of approval 😉

26 Oxford St, Cambridge, MA 02138

Wellesley College Clapp Library

It’s not often an architecture firm gets to keep coming back to a site for new additions to their original work. First designed by Shepley, Rutan, & Collidge in the Renaissance style, the Clapp Library at Wellesly College has continued to be reshaped by the firm and its later iterations (now Shepley Bulfinch). In 1959, 1977, and now in the 21st Century, Shepley Bulfinch has been brought in to expand the library further first built from a donation by philanthropist Andrew Carnegie. While the library itself works on expanding minds, we’re looking forward to what Shepley-designed expansion will come next.

106 Central St, Wellesley, MA 02482

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Boston, Massachusetts

The First State

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Boston, Massachusetts

The First State

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Italy

Switzerland

The Seventh Continent

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AWA, Vol. 2 (2024)

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Through Our Eyes: Boston

Shhhhhh...

Let the city do the talkin'

Welcome to the Countway Library

A haven of many medical firsts

Central Park Lanes

Boston Athenaeum

Brattle Book Shop

Boch Wang Theater

Christian Science Center Plaza

Mapparium

Polaroid Building

Harvard University Stadium

The Harvard Museum of Natural History

Wellesley College Clapp Library

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