What to See in Brookfield - Top Sights and Attractions

Brookfield Craft Center, located in Brookfield, Connecticut, is a 501 not-for-profit organization, founded in 1954 with the mission "to teach and preserve the skills of fine craftsmanship and enable creativity and personal growth through craft education." Subjects taught at the craft center include basketry, beadwork, blacksmithing, bladesmithing, ceramics, glass, jewelry making, metalsmithing, fiber and weaving, woodturning, woodworking, photography, paper and book arts, decorative arts, painting and drawing, and business / marketing for artists.

Its 2.5-acre (1.0 ha) campus is located 6 miles (9.7 km) north of Danbury, Connecticut, on the banks of the Still River, with an historic mill building as its centerpiece. Its six buildings house seven fully equipped studios, an exhibition gallery, a retail craft gallery and gift shop, and housing for visiting faculty.^[1]

The Brookfield Center Historic District in Brookfield, Connecticut is a historic district that was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1991. It is located in the vicinity of the junction of Route 133 and Route 25. The district represents the original settlement of the town of Brookfield and contains 67 residential, religious, and municipal buildings over a 43-acre area representing a wide range of architectural styles from the 18th to 20th centuries including Bungalow/Craftsman, Greek Revival, and Queen Anne style architecture. The district includes the old town hall, the Congregational Church of Brookfield, Saint Joseph Church & Elementary School, Center Elementary School, the former general store, St. Paul's Episcopal Church, and the surrounding residential neighborhood. The district is architecturally significant as an accurate representation of the historical development of the original settlement of the Town of Brookfield as the buildings are well-preserved from the time they were built with minimal alterations and intrusions, including their spatial relationships to one another.

The area that is now Brookfield was settled about 1700, and was given its own parish in 1754, formed out of portions of Danbury, New Milford, and Newtown. It was incorporated in 1788. The road junction was where the first church, town hall, school, and tavern were built. In addition to housing the central religious and political functions, the center area was also home to a number of private schools in the 19th century.

Contributing properties in the district include:

• 150 Whisconier Road, c. 1700, a saltbox
• 140 Whisconier Road, a vernacular building with selected Federal style details, has semi-elliptical attic windows
• Congregational Church, an 1854 Greek Revival church designed by Beckwith Nash
• St. Paul's School (3 Longmeadow Hill Road), a building in the Italianate style
• 1907 gymnasium building of the Curtis School for Boys, now in use as the Brookfield Theatre for the Arts, a building in the Rustic Style.

Town in Connecticut. Brookfield is a town in Fairfield County, Connecticut, United States, situated within the southern foothills of the Berkshire Mountains. The population was 17,528 at the 2020 census. The town is located 55 miles northeast of New York City, making it part of the New York metropolitan area. In July 2013, Money magazine ranked Brookfield the 26th-best place to live in the United States, and the best place to live in Connecticut.

Brookfield was first settled in 1710 by John Muirwood, as well as other colonial founders including Hawley, Peck and Merwin. They bartered for the land from the Wyantenuck Nation and the Pootatuck Nation who were ruled under the Sachem Waramaug and Pocono. The purchase of the southern portion of town involved the current Municipal Center where Sachem Pocono then had his village and lived in an enormous palisade along the Still River. Eventually, when the town was settled, it was first established as the Parish of Newbury, which incorporated parts of neighboring Newtown and Danbury. The town of Brookfield was established in 1788. It was named after the first minister of the parish's Congregational church, Reverend Thomas Brooks.^[3]