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Turkana Odyssey

Berkshire Property Agents

Filler - No Boundaries

Seven Salon Spa

Cupboards and Roses

Travel Essentials

Amtrak Empire Service between Albany, Hudson or Rhinecliff, NY and Penn Station, NYC

Amtrak 449 Lake Shore Limited between Pittsfield and South Station, Boston

Bonanza Bus Lines between Williamstown, Lee, Stockbridge, Great Barrington, MA, or Canaan, CT and Port Authority Bus Terminal, NYC

Mega-bus between Albany and Ridgewood, N.J. and Penn Station, NYC

Metro-North Railroad between Wassaic, Dover Plains, or Poughkeepsie, NY and Harlem (125th Street)  or Grand Central Station, NYC

Peter Pan Bus Lines between *Albany, Great Barrington, *Lee, Lenox, *Pittsfield, Stockbridge, Williamstown and Boston South Station and Boston Logan Airport  (*greater frequency, better fares)

Weather Underground
The radar is especially useful for tracking snow, sleet and thunderstorms.

Gas Prices
The price of gas at many of the stations in your zip code and those immediately surrounding it. 

Historic Homes, Museums & Gardens

Adams, MA
Susan B. Anthony Birthplace & Museum

Annandale-on-Hudson, NY
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Montgomery Place
A 434-acre intact Hudson River Valley estate

Athens, NY

Howard Hall Farm a laboratory for restoration training

Austerlitz, NY

Old Austerlitz

Catskill, NY

Cedar Grove home of Hudson River School founder, painter Thomas Cole

Germantown, NY

Clermont an early Hudson River estate

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Olana home of Hudson River School painter Frederic Church

Hudson, NY

The American Museum of Firefighting

Hyde Park, NY

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Home of U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt

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The Vanderbilt Mansion relic of the Gilded Age

Kent, CT

Sloane Stanley Museum artist’s studio and tool collection

Kinderhook, NY

U. S. President Martin Van Buren house

Lenox, MA

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The Mount Edith Wharton’s estate and gardens

Frelinghuysen Morris House & Studio Cubist paintings in a Modernist house

Ventfort Hall the Gilded Age Museum

Old Chatham, NY

Shaker Museum and Library

Pittsfield, MA

Hancock Shaker Village

Arrowhead home of Herman Melville.

Rhinebeck, NY

Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome aircraft and auto museum; air shows

Wilderstein Historic Site elaborate Queen-Anne style house of the Suckleys. 

Poughkeepsie, NY

Locust Grove home of Samuel F.B. Morse

Sheffield, MA

Ashley House c. 1735 house; oldest in Berkshire County

Staatsburgh, NY

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Mills Mansion house remodeled in Beaux Arts style by McKim, Mead & White

Stockbridge, MA

Chesterwood Estate & Museum home of Lincoln memorial sculptor Daniel Chester French

Mission House 1739 house with Colonial Revival garden

Rural Intelligence Road Trips
Naumkeag McKim, Mead & White summer cottage and gardens

Williamstown, MA

The Folly at Field Farm Modernist house and sculpture garden

[See more Excursion articles]

The Wassaic Project: A Pop-Up Museum and Pizza, Too

Rural Intelligence: Rural Road Trips: Excursions Image

Angelo Womack has brought his pizza oven to the Wassaic Project.

“Everybody is asking if this is an art installation or a real pizza oven,” said Angelo Womack, who was splitting wood on Wednesday outside Maxon Mills (below), which is the headquarters for the third iteration of the Wassaic Project Summer Festival. “This is a real wood-fired oven. It will become part of the Lantern Inn on the other side of the railroad tracks after the festival. I have travelled all over Italy and I make real Italian pizza. I’ve been making pizza in Brooklyn for years.” 

This weekend, August 5 - 7, you will feel like you’re in a rural version of Brooklyn if you head a half mile south of the Wassaic MetroNorth train station. There will be hundreds of young artists and musicians decked out in artisanal T-shirts who’ll be camping on the field outside the old Luther Barn. You can eat hand-crafted pizzas alongside them while listening to 23 live music shows and viewing on-site art installations, film screenings, and dance performances.

Rural Intelligence Road TripsWhen RI met Wassaic co-founders Eve Biddle and Bowie Zunino two years ago, we were immediately smitten by their spunk and aesthetics, and soon they were discovered by The New York Times. The festival weekend is a true multi-generational, multi-disciplinary happening that is free (donations encouraged) so you don’t have to make a major commitment to be on the cutting edge. As the Wassaic Project has grown, the founders have taken on a third partner (Jeff Barnett-Winsby) and brought in other curators: Ryan Frank and Risa Shoup have put together an exhibition called Ode Hotel; Eric Gleason and Ethan Greenbaum have organized The Finishers.  Here’s a preview of the 2011 edition of The Wassaic Project. (Our advice: Wear comfortable shoes if you plan on seeing all seven floors of art in the Maxon Mills granary.)

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Installations on the sixth floor of Maxon Mills.

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A mixed media piece by Amy Podmore, a professor at Williams College.

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Moria Kelly’s Will and Jimmy at the Old Hotel.

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C-prints by Eliza Swann.

The Wassaic Project - August 5 - 7
37 Furnace Bank Road Wassaic, NY

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Posted by Dan Shaw on 08/03/11 at 03:29 PM • Permalink