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The room itself is simply furnished but cozy, featuring a wooden sleigh bed, a wash basin, and embroidery threads and tools. The famous half-moon-shaped desk, where Alcott wrote Little Women in 1868, was built by her father. The house was occupied until in 1911 when the Concord Women's Club decided to purchase the house as a permanent memorial to Louisa May Alcott. Since approximately 80 percent of the furnishings on display were owned by the Alcotts, the rooms look very much as they did when the family lived here. Please take a few moments to browse our site for background on the Alcotts and Orchard House and to preview your visit experience.
A look inside Orchard House
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In addition to refusing to employ corporal punishment and allowing students to ask questions and be active participants in the learning process, Bronson was also the first educator in Boston to permit an African American student to enroll in his class. Refusing to sacrifice his ideals for the chance to remain financially solvent, Bronson saw many of his schools close, losing a lot of money in the process. In 1857, Amos Bronson Alcott purchased 12 acres of land with a manor house that had been on the property since the 1660s for $945. He then moved a small tenant farmhouse and joined it to the rear of the larger house, making many improvements over the course of the next year, as he detailed in his journals.
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Leaders of the transcendentalist movement, including Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, and Nathaniel Hawthorne, were frequent visitors. Emerson supported Bronson’s idea for the Concord School of Philosophy, one of the first adult education programs in the country. The school, open to anyone who wanted to learn—including women—first met in Bronson’s study in Orchard House, then later moved to a barn-like structure on the property, which still stands today. To guarantee admission, we encourage reserving Timed-Entry tickets online, but "walk-ins" may also be accommodated. As always, our gardens and grounds remain free and accessible to all, while Virtual Tours provide an enjoyable way to experience Orchard House from the comfort of your own home.
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The master bedroom reflects Mrs. Alcott's taste and contains many of her possessions, including family paintings and photographs, household furnishings, and handmade quilts. In later years, Mrs. Alcott often spent many of her free moments here reading, writing in her journal, and having tea. Several of May Alcott's highly acclaimed copies of Joseph Turner's landscapes also adorn the walls in this room. How much of the story in Little Women is embodied in the rooms of the house and the renowned family that inhabited it? The semi-autobiographical portrait of the March family did indeed draw a great deal of inspiration from the Alcott’s Orchard House years.
Notably, the nineteenth-century author Louisa May Alcott wrote Little Women here in 1868. Alcott's father Bronson established one of the first adult summer schools in the eastern United States. On the grounds to the west of the house is a structure designed and built by Bronson Alcott originally known as "Hillside Chapel," and later as "The Concord School of Philosophy." Operating from 1879 to 1888, the School was one of the first highly successful adult education centers in the country.
"Welcome to Our Home" offers an interactive tour with an expert living history guide, allowing for intimate access to fascinating anecdotes about the Alcotts' lives and times. 19th Century games, songs, and a treasure hunt round out this memorable experience suitable for all ages. Offered the fourth Saturday of each month through November, as well as during February and April school vacation. The youngest Alcott daughter -- and model for "Amy March" in Little Women -- was a talented artist in real life as well as in fiction.
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The Alcott family comes to life through the tour guide’s narrative, and questions are cheerfully answered along the way. Orchard House, best known as the home in which Louisa May Alcott wrote Little Women, is a literary site that’s a must-do for devotees of this classic American author. Orchard House is adjacent to The Wayside on the historic "American Mile" roadway toward Lexington, and is less than a half-mile from Bush, the home of Ralph Waldo Emerson,[11] where Henry David Thoreau and the Alcotts were frequent visitors. Despite being over 350 years old and uninsulated, Orchard House offers one of the most comfortable visit experiences while helping to save our planet via use of one of the most sustainable forms of energy available -- geothermal -- for our climate control system. Not only have our ground source heat pumps been able to easily adjust interior temperatures in both the House and School of Philosophy year-round, they eliminated our reliance on fossil fuels, and slashed our utility bills by nearly 60%! We believe our commitment to sustainability would have greatly pleased the Alcotts, who were themselves loving and responsible stewards of the many gifts Nature provides to humankind.
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Alcott staff speak English and Korean and everyday services include a specific meal and activity program to accommodate Korean-speaking patients. Louisa took up the mantle in her teens, earning money by doing whatever work was open to a woman of her time — sewing, teaching, acting, and finally, of course, writing. Where Bronson Alcott failed, she succeeded in becoming the breadwinner of the family. Bronson couldn’t bear to tear down the once-grand house, which was built in the 1600s. He spent a year fixing up the house—surrounded by 12 acres of apple orchards—before moving his family into what he named Orchard House.
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The four daughters—Anna (the oldest), Louisa (one year younger), Elizabeth (three years younger than Louisa), and Abigail (the youngest, five years younger than Elizabeth)—lived in Orchard House from 1858 to 1877. In the “Weekend Away” section (pages 68-73, accessible via the link below), Orchard House is one of the sites that Yankee recommends to visit — even if only on the outside — during a Spring weekend trip to Lexington and Concord. Watch a two-minute trailer for our Emmy Award-winning Documentary to discover why so many visitors have considered Orchard House an abiding, inspirational place for over 110 years.
Little Women was hammered out in six weeks at the desk in her bedroom in Orchard House; its immediate success surprised both the author and her publisher. Alcott based the character of Jo March on herself, weaving in her own struggles and experiences as a female writer in the 19th century. The three remaining March sisters were inspired by Alcott’s real life siblings, May, Anna, and Lizzie. Alcott’s sister May—a famous artist in her own right—painted owls on the walls and mantle of Louisa’s room because they were her favorite bird; she hoped they would bring Louisa comfort and inspiration.
The three years they spent at the rented Hosmer Cottage were described as idyllic.[10] By 1843, the Alcott family moved, along with six other members of the Consociate Family,[8] to the Utopian Fruitlands community for a brief interval in 1843–1844. After the collapse of the Utopian Fruitlands, they rented rooms and finally, with Abigail May Alcott's inheritance and financial help from Emerson, they purchased a homestead in Concord. They moved into the home they named "Hillside" on April 1, 1845, but had moved on by 1852, when it was sold to Nathaniel Hawthorne, who renamed it The Wayside. Moving 21 times in 30 years, the Alcotts returned to Concord once again in 1857 and moved into Orchard House, a two-story clapboard farmhouse, in the spring of 1858.
Important details about touring Orchard House are provided below to assist with planning a visit, whether you're an individual, couple, family, school, scout troop, or group excursion. If you need further assistance, please drop us a line via the Contact Form near the bottom of this page. Walk, run, stroll, or shimmy during our fun, fitness-focused event that can be done anywhere in the world, in any weather!
This more formal room used primarily for entertaining and special family events is decorated with earth-toned wallpaper and a green patterned carpet that contrasts with the burgundy-themed Study across the hall. Arched niches were built by Mr. Alcott to display busts of his favorite philosophers, Socrates and Plato, but during the 1860s, statuettes by John Rogers, depicting important themes and events of the Civil War, were often displayed instead. Family portraits of Mr. and Mrs. Alcott and watercolors by May -- along with her pen and ink drawing of Moses on the fireboard -- enliven the room.
There is limited parking directly in front of Orchard House (including one handicapped spot), but one short block away on Hawthorne Lane is a large parking lot that we share with the National Park Service. A crosswalk facilitates access to the sidewalk that leads to Orchard House within just a few minutes of walking. For informational purposes only, a link to the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) Open Payments web page is provided here. The federal Physician Payments Sunshine Act requires that detailed information about payment and other payments of value worth over ten dollars ($10) from manufacturers of drugs, medical devices, and biologics to physicians and teaching hospitals be made available to the public. When in Concord, you owe it to yourself to visit the beautiful public library; if you have another half day to spare and want to visit the Hawthorne, Emerson, and Thoreau sites, consult these posts on Books Tell You Why and Bookriot.
There have been no significant changes to the structure of the building since the nineteenth century. It was never painted, but allowed to weather and become a natural part of its environment. Orchard House has continued the tradition of Mr. Alcott's Concord School of Philosophy by hosting "The Summer Conversational Series" since 1977, and has recently added a "Teacher Institute" component. The Hillside Chapel is also used for youth programs, poetry readings, historical reenactments, and other special events.
Rentals of our historic facilities are arranged on a case-by-case basis in consultation with our Executive Director. Please send an email with as much detail about your event as possible, including any tentative dates for your event, well in advance. As of May 11, 2023, Orchard House is a "mask-friendly" site, but face masks are optional for entry. Complimentary individually-packaged masks in adult and child sizes are available at our Front Desk. We urge all visitors to reserve tickets online via our Timed-Entry Admission system to guarantee being able to visit on the date and at the time you prefer. Although we may often sell out of tickets, we do our best to accommodate as many "walk-in" visitors as possible.
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