Weir Farm National Historical Park

The Only Unit Of The National Park System Dedicated To American Painting; The Farm, House And Studios Of The Impressionist Julian Alden Weir, Who Bought It In 1882, Preserved With The Landscape He And His Circle Painted · Wilton, Connecticut

Julian Alden Weir traded a painting for this farm in 1882 and spent the rest of his life painting the land around it, bringing Childe Hassam, John Twachtman and Albert Pinkham Ryder up from New York to do the same. That continued after his death through his daughter and then the sculptor Mahonri Young, so the property was worked by artists more or less continuously for a century, and almost nothing about the landscape was changed - the stone walls, the pond, the trees and the barns in the paintings are still where they were. In 1990 it became the only unit of the national park system devoted to American painting. The house and the studios are preserved with the paint still on the floors, and the park lends easels and materials so visitors can sit in the same spots and work - easels, paper and paint, lent free to anyone who walks in, which is the most distinctive thing about the place and which almost nobody uses. Entry, parking and the materials all cost nothing, and the grounds are open dawn to dusk every day of the year.

735 Nod Hill Road, Wilton, Wilton, Connecticut, 06897, United States

The grounds, the trails and the painting sites are open daily from dawn to dusk, free, all year. The visitor centre and the historic buildings keep shorter hours on a reduced weekly schedule and are generally closed for part of the week and through much of the winter. Guided tours of the Weir house and the studios run seasonally on a published timetable. The Take Part in Art programme lends materials whenever the visitor centre is staffed.

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