Discover Middlesex: Architecture, Performance and a Riverside Park

Architecture, performing arts and an urban riverside park give your trip to Middlesex a range of different highlights. Examples from New Brunswick include Kirkpatrick Chapel, the New Brunswick Performing Arts Center and Boyd Park: three very different themes, from High Victorian Gothic architecture to theater and rehearsal spaces to exhibits along the Raritan River. As you plan your trip, you can consider whether you’d like to focus on architecture, the performing arts or the landscape.

Gothic Revival and Tiffany Glass

Kirkpatrick Chapel was built in 1873 by Henry Janeway Hardenbergh. It is an example of High Victorian Gothic ecclesiastical architecture.

The chapel also features four stained-glass windows from the studios of Louis Comfort Tiffany. They date from the late 19th century. The windows connect the chapel’s history with another artistic perspective and offer a specific detail to focus on. Travelers with different interests can consider architectural history and glass design as two distinct ways to shape their cultural itinerary.

Theater and artistic work

The New Brunswick Performing Arts Center has two state-of-the-art theater stages: the Elizabeth Ross Johnson Theater and the Arthur Laurents Theater. The two venues serve students and faculty of the Mason Gross School of the Arts as additional performance spaces for film, dance, theater and music. The range of art forms offers different ways to engage with the performing arts without limiting your interest to a single discipline.

The center also includes dedicated rehearsal studios and shared workspaces for arts organizations throughout the region. Alongside its two stages, it therefore offers spaces for rehearsals and collaborative work. This gives you a clear cultural focus to consider when planning your trip: you can ask yourself whether stage arts and the various forms of film, dance, theater and music suit the stay you have in mind.

Boyd Park: Riverside Scenery and Canal History

Boyd Park is a 20-hectare urban riverside park. Its distinctive features include historic views of the Raritan River and the New Brunswick skyline. Its size and riverside setting set it apart from the cultural offerings of the chapel and the Performing Arts Center. If you’d like to include landscapes and city views in your trip, the park offers a distinct way to explore the area.

Boyd Park also uses exhibits made from new and recycled materials to present historic and modern technologies used in the construction of the historic D&R Canal in New Brunswick.

Which kind of trip is right for you?

When choosing a vacation rental in Middlesex, you can first consider which of these perspectives you’d like your trip to center on: the architecture of Kirkpatrick Chapel, the different performing arts at the New Brunswick Performing Arts Center, or the combination of a riverside park and canal history at Boyd Park. These interests are distinct themes to help with your planning, not a single combined route.

If you’d like to discover more destinations, you can also visit Cape May.

For the broader travel overview: New Jersey.