Your essential guide to Boston

READ

It may be the third oldest bookstore in the whole of the US, but Brattle Book Shop’s outdoor shelves, built into the walls of an adjacent red-brick courtyard, have cast a spell on the Instagram generation. Inside, visitors can flip through some 250,000 books, maps, prints and postcards and tiptoe around the rarefied book room, home to many first editions.

DINE

Gordon Ramsay may have spent hours filming in New England for his hit show Kitchen Nightmares, but his first restaurant in the region’s capital is a dream. On the ground floor of Mandarin Oriental, Boston, Ramsay’s Kitchen serves the chef’s signature beef Wellington alongside lobster and clam bouillabaisse and other East Coast-inspired numbers. Take in the buzzing atmosphere from the vantage of a high-top chair at the bar, which is designed to ape the city’s cabled-stayed Zakim Bridge.

WANDER

Nineteenth-century socialite and collector Isabella Stewart Gardner’s namesake museum is a trove of Rembrandts, Botticellis, Raphaels and more. Today, the property is an ode to Gardner’s favourite Venice. She shipped balconies, arches and windows salvaged from neglected palazzos for its construction. It was also where the world’s largest art heist took place, and, if you’re called Isabella, you can peruse its priceless contents for free.

RIDE

Unique to the city, the Swan Boats in Boston’s Public Garden have been taking visitors on 15-minute gondola rides around its weeping willow-lined lagoon since 1877. Elsewhere, a series of bronze duckling sculptures in the park’s northeastern corner pay homage to a Boston-set children’s book Make Way for Ducklings. For more sculpture, stroll to neighbouring Boston Commons to discover The Embrace, a 22ft-tall memorial to Martin Luther King Jr.

SHOP

The SoWa Vintage Market prides itself on never missing a Sunday. Purchase a coffee from Tatte Bakery (five minutes from the market), and arrive between 10am and 4pm for vintage-touting vendors and one-off finds. It’s open year-round, but flourishes in spring when it sprouts a flurry of food trucks and outdoor stalls as part of its seasonal open market.

SEE

The Museum of Fine Arts may look like the Pantheon on the outside, but inside, Dale Chihuly’s Lime Green Icicle Tower and Yoshitomo Nara’s giant fibreglass puppy, Your Dog, announce a more forward-facing affair. The bulk of the collection, however, is a medley of Flemish portraits, Impressionist oil paintings and 20th-century surrealist landscapes, but there’s plenty of photography and more sculpture, too, plus live workshops too.

RELAX

The Spa at Mandarin Oriental, Boston is one of North America’s finest hotel spas, according to the World Spa Awards, which awarded it top spot in 2022. The facilities (and 16,000sqft space) are resplendent: ice baths, experiential showers, saunas, crystal steam rooms, whirlpools, spa suites, plus specialist treatments that include posture therapy and a Himalayan singing bowls experience.

DRINK

The Wig Shop is one of Boston’s sultriest speakeasies, marked only by the neon-lit shopfront and mannequins that belonged to this former wig store. Inside, a dimly lit orchestra of mixologists is led by Oscar Simoza Miszlai, whose Rise & Grind – a cream-topped rum and cold brew concoction – is utterly reviving after a long day pounding Boston’s pavements.

CHEER

Seeing a game at Fenway, the oldest ballpark in the US, is a local’s rite of passage. It has a 38,000-seat capacity, so it’s best to book tickets online in good time. Failing that, a behind-the-scenes tour will take you around the Red Sox’s beloved home and tell tales of the stadium’s colourful history. Head to the sports bar located underneath the centerfield bleachers for unparalleled views of the pitch.

WALK

If you’re interested in the history of the tinderbox that lit the American Revolution, you’ll want to put aside a couple of hours to walk Boston’s Freedom Trail. Follow it at your own pace using information from the route’s official website or go guided with a food or booze-themed tour. Refuel along the way with a chowder at Union Oyster House, America’s oldest restaurant.

DRIVE

Boston doubles up as the perfect starting line for an outstanding New England road trip. Pick up the keys to your Porsche 911 Carrera from Gotham Dream Cars (it has a super fleet for hire in Boston) and drive two hours north to Portland, Maine – one of the East Coast’s true gems. Stop at Harvard’s campus in Cambridge, the witch-inspired museums of Salem and carry on to the charming coastal towns of Portsmouth, York and Ogunquit. Once in Portland, toast the trip over small plates at top-rated eatery Central Provisions.

CRUISE

Some 70 miles south of Boston, the Cape Cod peninsula is New England’s nautical nirvana. The beaches – pine-backed, dune-sloped and with front-row seats to cresting humpbacks – are some of the country’s finest. From Boston, take the fast ferry to the Cape’s pseudo capital of Provincetown, where you can break up gallery-hopping at its famous Lobster Pot restaurant, home to one of the best lobster rolls on the East Coast.

Boston is steeped in history – we’re often asked to recommend the best attractions for uncovering its past, and one of my firm favourites is the Boston Tea Party Ships & Museum. It puts on a re-enactment of the event that’s said to have sparked the American Revolution – where hundreds of chests of tea belonging to the British East India Company were thrown into Boston Harbour by American patriots – using interactive exhibits, immersive theatre, live actors and a life-size 18th-century replica ship to draw visitors in. It’s a fantastic activity for the whole family.

- The concierge team at Mandarin Oriental, Boston.