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America's oldest art colony, a music-history landmark, and a walkable village on the edge of the Catskills.
A century-old art colony and music town, tucked under Overlook Mountain on the edge of the Catskills.
Woodstock has been an art town for well over a century. It began with Byrdcliffe, the Arts & Crafts colony founded on the mountainside in 1902, followed by the Art Students League's summer school and, in 1916, Maverick Concerts — still the oldest continuous summer chamber-music series in the country. Generations of painters and writers followed the cheap rent and the light.
In the 1960s it became a music town, too. Bob Dylan and The Band lived and recorded in the area, and manager Albert Grossman built Bearsville Studios just west of the village. The festival that borrowed the town's name in 1969 was actually held some sixty miles away in Bethel — Woodstock had turned it down — but the association stuck, and the name became shorthand for a whole era.
Today Woodstock is a small Catskills village that still runs on art, music, and the mountains around it: a walkable Tinker Street of galleries, shops, and cafés, a Sunday drum circle on the Green, a Tibetan monastery up the road, and the Overlook Mountain trailhead rising right behind town.
A small town that spreads from a walkable green out to a music hamlet and a Catskills trailhead.
Tinker Street
The historic heart of town: a triangular green where Mill Hill Road becomes Tinker Street, ringed by galleries, cafés, shops, the 1844 Dutch Reformed Church, and the Colony music venue.
The Music Hamlet
A small hamlet just west on Route 212, famous as the music colony Albert Grossman built around Bearsville Studios — today a restored theater and creekside restaurant.
The Catskills Edge
The forested northern edge of town up Meads Mountain Road, climbing to the Overlook Mountain trailhead and fire tower, with the Karma Triyana Dharmachakra monastery across from it.
The painters, musicians, and makers who have kept Woodstock an artists' town for over a century.
Painters, musicians, craftspeople, and writers — Woodstock has drawn people who make things for more than a hundred years.
I am a dad who loves to play with my kids and go on adventures in HV!! I have lived here for 6yr now and still exploring!! I love to cook and eat food!! I enjoy lots of outdoor activities and sports!!
Hi! I grew up in Woodstock and moved back in 2003 to raise my 2 (launched) sons. I work freelance as a bookkeeper (and offer other financial services) and would love to meet people, find tennis (& pickleball) partners and enjoy this amazing area and community.
Woodstock scientist
Venetia is an interiors stylist, decorator, professional organizer and property manager based in Woodstock. She strongly believes in community and volunteers with the local school, after school programs and the Woodstock Library. In her spare time she can be found in the ceramics studio, and performing with performance art choir The Goddess Party.
Live event painter & studio illustrator for weddings, retail activations, and corporate experiences. Live watercolor guest painting, live mural painting, illustrations for event stationery and logo design in the Hudson Valley and globally.
Growth advisor to early-stage start-ups, as well as more established organizations looking to scale in new areas.
What's on, what's open, what's worth your time.
The concerts and gatherings that fill the calendar, the outlets covering a small mountain town, and the colonies, monasteries, and trails that draw people up here.
Late June–September
Founded in 1916, the oldest continuous summer chamber-music series in the country, held in a hand-built timber "music chapel" in the woods on the edge of the village. Saturday-evening and Sunday-afternoon concerts run from late June into September.
Annually, October
Founded in 2000 and headquartered in town, the "fiercely independent" festival screens new film across Woodstock and the surrounding Hudson Valley each October and is Oscar-qualifying in several short categories.
Sundays, spring–fall
For more than twenty-five years, an open, all-welcome drum circle has filled the Village Green on Sunday afternoons through the warm months — about as pure a distillation of Woodstock as exists.
Annually, late July
First held in 1931, the public library's signature summer fundraiser on the library lawn — live music, a children's parade and maypole, food, and the beloved Book Barn used-book sale.
December 24
A wholly volunteer-run tradition since 1932: a lit tree, carols, and Santa's famously secret, ever-changing mode of arrival — past entrances have included an elephant and a cannon.
Independent radio · 100.1 FM
On the air since 1980 and one of the few independently owned commercial FM stations left in the country — a pioneer of the adult-album-alternative format, licensed to Woodstock.
Weekly · Ulster Publishing
The Ulster Publishing news brand that still carries the long-running Woodstock Times (founded 1972), covering the town meeting by meeting alongside its sibling Ulster County weeklies.
Nonprofit newsroom
A reader-funded nonprofit newsroom covering Woodstock and the surrounding Catskills, with a free newsletter delivered every Friday morning.
Meads Mountain Road
The classic Woodstock hike: about two and a half miles up an old carriage road to a restored fire tower at 3,140 feet, with five-state views and the haunting concrete ruins of a 1920s mountain hotel along the way.
Above the village
Founded in 1902 on the slope above town, the oldest continuously operating arts-and-crafts colony in America. The Woodstock Byrdcliffe Guild still runs galleries, an artist residency, and performances in its 1903 theater.
Meads Mountain Road
The North American seat of the Karmapa and the Karma Kagyu lineage of Tibetan Buddhism, founded in 1976 above the village. Open for daily practice, weekend teachings, and tours of an ornate shrine room overlooking the Catskills.
Tinker Street
The triangular green at the center of town — fronted by the 1844 Dutch Reformed Church — is Woodstock's social heart, where Mill Hill Road becomes Tinker Street and the drum circle gathers on summer Sundays.
Tinker Street
Founded in 1919 as a direct outgrowth of the Woodstock art colony, one of the oldest continuing arts organizations in the country, pairing a historic permanent collection with rotating contemporary shows.
Bearsville
The Bearsville complex Albert Grossman — manager of Dylan, Janis Joplin, and The Band — began building just west of the village around 1970; the theater, completed in 1989, is back in action under Dayglo Presents, with a creekside restaurant alongside.
Galleries, record shops, candle makers, and farm-to-table kitchens line Tinker Street and Mill Hill Road. The directory tracks the people behind them.
Portrait photographer with a studio in Woodstock, and outpost at Greig Farm in Red Hook, NY For Business: Headshots, Actor Headshots, Brand Photography, and Content Days. Lifestyle work: Family Portraits, High School Seniors, Elopements.
Portrait photographer who loves to hear what you're up to, create a space to let you be you, and also tap into your charisma during the portrait session. Committed to fun and community. Always working on my Woodstock Townspeople project. Studio in Woodstock, living in Red Hook. Headshots, Elopements, Families, Content.
Randy Lane is an acupuncturist specializing in women's health issues (menopause, perimenopause, inducing labor), pain management, cosmetic acupuncture & microneedling, along with stress, anxiety and sleep pattern issues.
I am jewelry designer/maker & natural dye enthusiast working from my home studio in Woodstock, NY. My business is creating fine silver Talismans & Jewels & botanical print scarves; everything made by me in my home studio.
I am jewelry designer/maker and natural dye enthusiast working from my home studio in Woodstock, NY. My business is centered around creating fine silver metal clay Talismans and Jewels and botanical print silk and linen scarves; everything made by me in my home studio. I tend to work in series or collections, where every scarf and piece of jewelry is slow-made and absolutely one-of-a-kind.
No. Despite the name, the Woodstock Music & Art Fair of August 1969 took place on Max Yasgur's dairy farm in Bethel, NY — in Sullivan County, about 60 miles southwest. Organizers borrowed the town's name because they had hoped to stage it near Woodstock, long a musicians' haven, but the town turned them down and the festival moved on until it landed in Bethel.
Long before it became an art colony, the Woodstock area was part of the homeland of the Esopus, a Lenape people who spoke the Munsee dialect of Algonquian and lived in small settlements near water across what is now Ulster County. The Esopus Creek served as a travel and trade corridor linking the Catskills to the Hudson. Dutch colonial expansion led to the Esopus Wars (1659–1663) in nearby Hurley and Kingston, forcing the Esopus from the region; their descendants live on today in communities including the Stockbridge-Munsee Band of Mohican Indians, the Munsee-Delaware Nation, and the Ramapough Lenape Nation.
Woodstock is one of America's oldest art colonies — home to the Byrdcliffe Arts & Crafts colony (1902) and Maverick Concerts (1916), the country's oldest continuous summer chamber-music series. It has drawn artists and musicians for more than a century, including the 1960s circle around Bob Dylan and The Band, and today it's a walkable Catskills village of galleries, music venues, and trailheads.
By car it's roughly 100 miles and about two to two and a half hours: take the Thruway (I-87) to Exit 19 at Kingston, then Route 28 west to Route 375 and Route 212 into the village. Adirondack Trailways runs daily buses from Port Authority with a stop in the center of town; there's no passenger rail directly to Woodstock.
Yes. The trail starts at the parking area on Meads Mountain Road, about two miles up from the village, and climbs a wide old carriage road roughly two and a half miles each way — steep but steady — to the summit at 3,140 feet. Highlights include the ruins of the Overlook Mountain House and a restored fire tower; the Karma Triyana Dharmachakra monastery sits right across from the trailhead.
Byrdcliffe is the Arts & Crafts colony founded in 1902 by Ralph Radcliffe Whitehead on the slope just north of the village — often called the oldest operating arts-and-crafts colony in America. Inspired by John Ruskin and William Morris, it survives today as the nonprofit Woodstock Byrdcliffe Guild, which runs studios, classes, and a historic theater.
Fall is the busiest and most beautiful season — Catskills foliage typically peaks in early-to-mid October, drawing leaf-peepers to Overlook Mountain and the scenic drives (it's also the busiest time, so book ahead). Summer is the other high point, with Maverick Concerts, Bearsville Theater shows, the drum circle, and the Village Green at its liveliest.
The first capital of New York and a gateway between the Hudson and the Catskills.
A whaling port turned design capital, where a mile of nineteenth-century Warren Street climbs from the river.
Historic colleges, a thriving culinary scene, and the world's longest elevated pedestrian bridge.
Dramatic Hudson views, world-class architecture, and a waterfront that runs late.
World-class modern art, a boutique-lined Main Street, and incredible access to the Hudson Highlands.
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