Strawbery Banke Museum

Strawbery Banke Museum

Categories

Gallery/ShopActivitiesArts & CultureAttractionsEducationEvent & Function SpaceFamily FunHandicap AccessHistoryMuseumNon-Profit OrganizationsPark/Garden/BeachParkingPicnic AreaTourism members

Hours:

Historic Houses: Spring-Fall
Outdoor Ice-Skating: Winter
Events, Programs, & Workshops: Year-Round

Driving Directions:

GPS Coordinates for Strawbery Banke Museum: N43°4.4919, W070°45.198
Located downtown at intersection of Hancock & Marcy Streets.

About Us

Step into the past and explore 350+ years of history in the neighborhood of Puddle Dock at Strawbery Banke Museum.

Strawbery Banke Museum is unique amongst outdoor history museums in preserving a complete neighborhood’s evolution of over 350 years. The Museum is a real community telling the stories where people lived and worked for hundreds of years.

Explore historic houses, most on their original sites, including elegant mansions, working-class homes, a colonial tavern, and a 1940s corner store. Additionally, tour a cooper’s shop and a reproduction Native American wigwam. Strawbery Banke Museum's furnished houses and exhibit houses are open to the public for touring seasonally. The furnished houses are interpreted to different periods, with many of them furnished with the dishes, furniture, and other objects of their former owners. Some exhibit houses include the “People of the Dawnland” exhibit, exploring Abenaki culture; both past and present; “Water Has a Memory” exhibit, which educates visitors on the damaging effects to the historic houses from sea level rise and groundwater.

Meet the faces of history by talking to costumed historical roleplayers at Strawbery Banke who portray the real people who lived and worked in the Puddle Dock Neighborhood.

Spread across nearly 10 acres, the historic landscape at Strawbery Banke features a dozen gardens, with heirloom flowers, and vegetables.

The historic houses are open for tours seasonally. the Museum’s professionally-maintained outdoor skating rink operates from December through February.


Highlights

Images

Strawbery Banke is unique among outdoor history museums, sharing change over time in the same waterfront neighborhood. The Museum interprets a long span of history, from the history of Indigenous peoples (artifacts dating back to 10,000-12,000 years ago), to the present day.
Strawbery Banke preserves a complete neighborhood’s evolution of over 350 years, with most of its historic houses on their original sites.
The Museum’s furnished houses and exhibit houses are open to the public for touring seasonally.
The furnished houses are interpreted to different periods, with many of them furnished with the dishes, furniture, and other objects of their former owners.
Meet the faces of history by talking to costumed historical roleplayers at Strawbery Banke who portray the real people who lived and worked in the Puddle Dock Neighborhood.
Roleplayers speak from a historical perspective, meaning that they will only talk about the time in which their character lived. The costumes, props, and demonstrations they work into their interpretation are all period-appropriate.
Some exhibit houses include the “People of the Dawnland” exhibit, exploring Abenaki culture, arts, foodways, and storytelling traditions; both past and present; “Water Has a Memory” exhibit, which educates visitors on the damaging effects to the historic houses from sea level rise and groundwater.
Engage with the Museum’s roleplayers to get an in-depth look at a specific time and place in American history.
Spread across nearly 10 acres, the historic landscape at Strawbery Banke features a dozen gardens, with five set to period designs, heirloom flowers, and vegetables, bringing the experience of outdoor life for the families who have lived in this period for centuries.
The landscape invites you to visit period gardens and homes including a Victorian-era formal garden, a colonial period kitchen garden, a global herb garden, three heritage apple orchards, as well as a colonial revival pocket garden.
Lawns and picnic areas offer visitors the opportunity to picnic, relax, or play games in a beautiful historic neighborhood.
The historic houses are open for tours seasonally from the spring through the fall. Additionally, Strawbery Banke is open throughout the year for special events, programs, and workshops.
Candlelight Stroll invites visitors to step into the past and experience 400 years of seasonal and holiday traditions in the Puddle Dock neighborhood. The Museum’s furnished historic houses are adorned with handmade decorations created from greens and dried flowers from the Museum’s heirloom gardens.
Labrie Family Skate at Puddle Dock Pond, the Museum’s professionally-maintained outdoor skating rink operates from December through February.