Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum
In 1990, thieves walked out with thirteen works worth $500 million — none have ever come back, and the case is still open.
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Gardner built this Venetian Renaissance palace between 1898 and 1901, then spent a year personally placing paintings, furniture, and textiles from different cultures and periods so each room feels like a private home, not a gallery. A 2012 Renzo Piano wing sits alongside the original structure near the Back Bay Fens.
What to look for
- The Botticelli acquired in 1894 through Bernard Berenson — Gardner became the first American to own a painting by a Renaissance master
- The Renzo Piano auxiliary wing from 2012, adjacent to the original 15th-century Venetian palace structure
- The deliberately mixed rooms where Gardner personally arranged paintings, furniture, and textiles from different cultures and periods side by side
Located near the Back Bay Fens in Boston; the original Fenway Court building dates to 1901 and the museum opened to the public January 1, 1903.
Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum is one of 31 sights worth the detour in Boston, all bundled offline in Voyage GO — download the Boston pack and it sits on your map with no signal, filling your travel passport the moment you walk past.
More to see in Boston
- Museum of Fine Arts BostonFour hundred and fifty thousand works of art under one roof — one of the most comprehensive collections in the Americas.
- TD GardenThe subway stops underneath it — TD Garden is built directly above MBTA's North Station, so you step off the train and you are already at the door.
- Harvard College ObservatoryOn the night of July 16-17, 1850, astronomers here made the first daguerreotype of a star — Vega — through a telescope that was the largest in North America.
- Fenway ParkThe oldest active ballpark in MLB, where a cramped city block accidentally invented some of baseball's most famous features.
- Boston Public LibraryJohn Adams' personal 3,800-volume library lives here — and any Massachusetts adult can walk in and access it.
- Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & SmithsonianThe lab that produced the first-ever image of a black hole sits right on the Harvard campus.