Byrdcliffe Historic District

Byrdcliffe is an arts and crafts colony on the southeast slope of a spur of Overlook Mountain in Woodstock, New York. Ralph Radcliffe Whitehead, an Anglo-American admirer of John Ruskin, founded it in 1902-1903 and chose Woodstock after a long search. The colony once covered about twelve hundred acres, with a surrounding buffer of farm and woodland meant to protect the landscape. The nominated district keeps the core community, with fifty-three buildings. Bolton Brown drew the plans to Whitehead's instructions. The buildings show a restrained Western Stick style with Swiss or Styrian touches such as broad gables, balconies, exposed timbers and wide roofs. Key buildings include White Pines, the Villetta boarding house, the Byrdcliffe Studio, the barn and the Lark's Nest, a converted farmhouse that hosted thinkers such as John Dewey. The colony never fully achieved its founder's economic aims, yet it led to the Woodstock art colony and the Maverick Festivals. Its surviving buildings record that movement.