Hartford, United States: Self-Guided Walking Tour

Looking for things to do in Hartford? Connecticut’s capital brings together eighteenth-century houses, literary landmarks, major museums, religious buildings and striking civic architecture. From the Old State House and Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art to the homes of Mark Twain and Harriet Beecher Stowe, Hartford rewards visitors who explore it on foot. Neywo offers a free audio guide for Hartford with 60 narrated places.

What to See in Hartford

Butler-McCook Homestead

The Butler-McCook Homestead is one of Hartford’s few surviving eighteenth-century homes. Built in 1782 for physician Dr. Daniel Butler, the two-and-a-half-story house remained in the Butler family for almost two centuries before becoming a museum. Its furnishings and decorative objects show how domestic life and design changed from the Colonial period through the Victorian era. The homestead and its grounds were added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1971.

Old State House

Completed in 1796, the Old State House is a former government building where Connecticut’s public life unfolded for more than two centuries. Its restored exterior and Senate chamber reflect the Federal style, while the Representative’s chamber shows the Victorian period and other interiors use Colonial Revival design. The building is also associated with the opening of the Amistad trial in 1839.

One of its most unusual attractions is the Joseph Steward Museum of Curiosities, whose collection includes a two-headed calf, a two-headed pig, oversized animals and machinery with unknown original uses. The building is generally believed to have been designed by Charles Bulfinch as his first public building.

Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art

The castle-like Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art is one of the essential things to do in Hartford for art lovers. Founded in 1842 and opened two years later, it is the oldest continually operating public art museum in the United States and the largest art museum in Connecticut, with 75,000 square feet of exhibition space.

Its collections range from ancient Egyptian and Classical bronzes to European Baroque art, French and American Impressionism, Hudson River School landscapes, modern and contemporary works, early American furniture, decorative arts and costumes. A celebrated work in the collection is John Trumbull’s Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776. Important donations came from Elizabeth Jarvis Colt, John Pierpont Morgan and the family of Daniel Wadsworth.

A. Everett Austin House

The A. Everett Austin House is a compact classical house museum and National Historic Landmark on Scarborough Street. Chick Austin, director of the Wadsworth Atheneum from 1927 to 1944, created it with a passion for Italian architecture.

The house is only one room deep, measuring 86 feet long and 18 feet wide. Its façade has symmetrical wings, a central pedimented pavilion and shallow Ionic pilasters. Some windows are blind, while the suggested balustrade above the entrance is made from decorative half-round balusters attached to the wall. The result is an elegant and deliberately theatrical building.

Mark Twain House

The Mark Twain House and Museum preserves the Hartford home where Samuel Langhorne Clemens—known as Mark Twain—lived with his family from 1874 to 1891. Designed by Edward Tuckerman Potter, the house is an exuberant example of American High Gothic architecture, with steep gables, elaborate woodwork and an asymmetrical design.

Twain’s top-floor billiards room also served as his private study. He wrote, entertained friends and enjoyed time away from the household there. In 1881, he brought Louis Comfort Tiffany into the project of redecorating the interiors and adopted new technology, including the telephone.

Harriet Beecher Stowe House

The Harriet Beecher Stowe House, now known as the Stowe Center for Literary Activism, was Harriet Beecher Stowe’s home for the final 23 years of her life. She began writing from its sunny bow window after the house was sufficiently complete in spring 1864 and remained there until her death in 1896.

The two-story brick house combines Gothic Revival and Italianate elements. Its details include a jerkin-headed gable, decorative bargeboard trim and Italianate brackets. Inside, the center hall connects parlors, a dining room, kitchen and pantry on the ground floor, with bedrooms upstairs. Stowe took an active interest in the house’s construction, including its practical infrastructure.

Connecticut Museum of Culture and History

Formerly known as the Connecticut Historical Society, the Connecticut Museum of Culture and History brings together exhibitions, a library, an archive, a research center and education programs. The institution was founded in Hartford in 1825 and is Connecticut’s official state historical society.

Its collections include more than 270,000 artifacts and graphics, as well as over 100,000 books and pamphlets. The name changed in 2023 to reflect the institution’s broader cultural mission.

Connecticut Science Center

The Connecticut Science Center occupies a nine-story building beside the Connecticut River, designed by César Pelli and Associates and opened on June 12, 2009. More than 40,000 square feet contain interactive exhibits covering physics, astronomy, geology and forensics.

Visitors can explore more than 165 hands-on experiences, along with four educational labs, a KidsZone and a 3D digital theater. The building also has an environmental distinction: it became the first science museum in the country to power its operations primarily with an on-site 200-kilowatt fuel cell system.

Keney Tower

Keney Tower rises 130 feet above a small public park at Main and Ely Streets. Built in 1898 as a memorial by Walter and Henry Keney to their mother, Rebecca Turner Keney, it is Hartford’s only free-standing tower.

The tower’s red sandstone came from Longmeadow, Massachusetts. Its Collegiate Gothic design includes buttresses, pinnacles and finial crosses, with a clock on each face. Above the clocks, lancet-arched louvers surround the bell chamber, whose chimes sound every quarter hour.

Hartford’s Religious Landmarks

Hartford’s religious buildings reflect the city’s diverse communities and architectural history. The Cathedral of St. Joseph, designed by Eggers and Higgins, gives the Gothic tradition an International Style interpretation. Its limestone façade includes a monumental frieze of Saint Joseph, while the interior features French stained-glass windows and the ceramic tile mural Christ in Glory.

The Church of the Good Shepherd and Parish House in the Coltsville area was commissioned by Elizabeth Jarvis Colt and designed by Edward Tuckerman Potter. Completed in 1867, with the parish house following in 1895, the Gothic Revival complex commemorates Samuel Colt and members of his family. A carving at the southwest entrance depicts tools used by workers at the Colt factory.

Other distinctive places include the Beth Hamedrash Hagodol Synagogue, a Romanesque Revival former synagogue built in 1921 and 1922; the Chevry Lomday Mishnayes Synagogue, whose 1924 design resembles an apartment house; the Bosnian-American Islamic Cultural Center; and the Amos Bull House, built around 1788 and one of Hartford’s few surviving eighteenth-century buildings.

Hartford’s historic setting also connects it to the wider region. For more destinations in the state, explore Connecticut, or continue planning a trip across the United States. Nearby New Haven offers another Connecticut city to discover.

Explore Hartford with Neywo

Neywo turns a Hartford self-guided walking tour into an easy way to explore the city independently. The Hartford audio guide includes five walking tours, one bus route and one bike route, covering 60 narrated places in total. Narration is available in 11 languages.

The walks include:

• Hartford Main Street: Steel, Silk and Colonial Stones — 2.35 km, 108 minutes and 12 stops
• Bushnell Park and the Capitol: Hartford’s Green Heart — 1.38 km, 52 minutes and 8 stops
• Nook Farm: Twain, Stowe and Hartford’s Literary Age — 3.06 km, 86 minutes and 5 stops
• Hartford’s North End: Faith, Freedom and a Red Sandstone Tower — 3.16 km, 83 minutes and 7 stops
• Charter Oak Quarter: Colt, Immigrants and Hartford’s Oldest Synagogue — 2.05 km, 60 minutes and 6 stops

There is also a 14.3-kilometre, 61-minute bus route with 8 stops, plus a 0.9-kilometre, 4-minute bike route with 4 stops. The app tells the story of each place as you reach it, at your own pace, with no group and no schedule. Download Neywo and explore Hartford as the city unfolds around you.