Vermont · United States

Lake Champlain

Burlington

From Granby to Lake Champlain: a town on a slope, a giant filing cabinet, the Ben & Jerry’s factory and a teddy bear works.

Lake Champlain

about 200 km north to south · between Vermont and New York State

The route

Granby → Burlington → Granby

There and back in a day · Vermont

The car

Rivian R1S

The border, Interstate 89, then the lake

CANADA USA GRANBY départ & retour La frontière BURLINGTON au bord du lac Shelburne Waterbury LAC CHAMPLAIN NEW YORK VERMONT Interstate 89

The line

35
89
7

it all leads
to the lake

35 89

Granby → the border, then 89
down to Lake Champlain.

we load the boot, a coffee, and off we go! heading south-west

Reading the map

  • a stop along the way
  • the way out, to the lake
  • the way home, to Granby
  • Lake Champlain
The Rivian R1S heading for Vermont
km 0 · Granby heading south-west
01

Burlington, Vermont

On the shore of Lake Champlain
Burlington sits on a slope running down to Lake Champlain. The town took hold here in the early 1770s, on Abenaki hunting grounds, and it grew in three tiers: wharves and warehouses at the water, commerce above them, houses at the top. You can still read that plan on foot — just look up towards the hill, or down towards the lake.

Its heart is Church Street. The idea of making it a pedestrian street came from Copenhagen: in 1962 a Burlington architecture student, Bill Truex, had seen Strøget, a thoroughfare given back to walkers. It took until 7 July 1980 for two blocks to be closed to cars, and until 15 September 1981 for the Church Street Marketplace to open. Today the street is alive from morning to night, between terraces, buskers and 19th-century facades.
Church Street
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Down to the lake
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
The upper town
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Wandering
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way
Church Street, Burlington’s pedestrian way

The market street

The Marketplace holds some sixty independent shops and a couple of dozen cafes and restaurants.

The plan

Trois terrasses

Wharves, then commerce, then houses: Burlington climbs in tiers from the water.

Due west

Across the lake begin New York State, and the Adirondacks.

The waterfront

This is where the town began: warehouses, floated timber, steamboats.

Church Street

Car-free since 7 July 1980, opened on 15 September 1981.

Strøget

The pedestrian street came from Copenhagen, seen in 1962 by student Bill Truex.

Lake Champlain

Two hundred kilometres north to south, between Vermont and New York State.

Three tiers

Burlington, 1770

Wharves below, commerce in the middle, houses on top: the town kept its plan.

Around

The forest starts where the street stops.

Due west

The lake faces the Adirondacks: the sun sets behind the far shore.

The shopfronts

Church Street lines up 19th-century and Art Deco facades.

Before the town

These shores were Abenaki hunting grounds.

Vermont

Maple, lake and hill: the town holds in those three words.

02

World’s Tallest Filing Cabinet

208 Flynn Avenue
A stack of steel filing cabinets welded one on top of another, taller than a three-storey building. It is the work of artist Bren Alvarez, raised in 2002, and its title says everything: “File Under So. Co., Waiting for…”.

The 38 drawers are not a decorative number: they count the years since a road scheme, the Southern Connector, was first proposed — in 1965. Thirty-eight years of files, studies and appeals, stacked for real. The tower stands over twelve metres. In 2020 it had to be shifted a few dozen metres… to make way for work on the very road it mocked. It now stands at 208 Flynn Avenue.
Thirty-eight drawers
Bren Alvarez’s tower of steel filing cabinets
Bren Alvarez’s tower of steel filing cabinets
Bren Alvarez’s tower of steel filing cabinets
Bren Alvarez’s tower of steel filing cabinets
Up close
Bren Alvarez’s tower of steel filing cabinets
Bren Alvarez’s tower of steel filing cabinets

The Southern Connector

Proposed in 1965, the road spent decades in studies and appeals.

Where to find it

208 Flynn Avenue

An ordinary lot, at the edge of the railway.

Bren Alvarez

Raised in 2002. A title shaped like a sigh: “File Under So. Co., Waiting for…”.

One drawer per year

1965 → 2002

Thirty-eight years of waiting for a road never built.

Moved in 2020

To make way for work on the road it mocked.

03

Ben & Jerry’s

From Burlington to Waterbury
Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield met in seventh-grade gym class. Years later they took a correspondence course in ice-cream making together — five dollars — and opened their first shop on 5 May 1978, in a disused petrol station in Burlington.

The station is gone; only a plaque on a car park remains. The factory was built in 1985 at Waterbury, some forty minutes away, and now turns out up to 350,000 pints a day. The guided tour shows the line from a glazed walkway, and ends with a tasting.
The Waterbury factory
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The tour
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
Around the factory
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont
The Ben & Jerry’s factory at Waterbury, Vermont

5 May 1978

Burlington

The first shop opened in a disused petrol station. Only a plaque remains.

To Waterbury

Some forty minutes south-east, through the hills.

On the hill

The factory sits below; the flavour graveyard looks down on it.

The pints

The line runs during the tour: you watch it actually working.

Since 1978

A Burlington petrol station, and a five-dollar correspondence course.

The factory

Waterbury, 1985

Up to 350,000 pints a day.

Vermont milk

The state’s dairy farms supply the cream.

The tasting

It closes the tour, and nobody complains.

The walkway

You watch the line from above, behind glass.

The course

Cinq dollars

Ben and Jerry met in seventh-grade gym class.

Waterbury

About forty minutes’ drive from Burlington.

04

Flavor Graveyard

On the hill behind the factory
Behind the factory, on a knoll, a real little cemetery: a railing, some grass, and headstones in Vermont granite. Each carries the name of a discontinued flavour, its dates, and an epitaph written by the company’s own copywriters.

The Flavor Graveyard opened in 1997. More than thirty flavours rest there. You read very solemn things about entirely unserious subjects, which is exactly the intention.
The headstones
The headstones of the discontinued flavours
The headstones of the discontinued flavours
The headstones of the discontinued flavours
The headstones of the discontinued flavours
The headstones of the discontinued flavours
The headstones of the discontinued flavours
The headstones of the discontinued flavours
The headstones of the discontinued flavours
The headstones of the discontinued flavours
The headstones of the discontinued flavours
The headstones of the discontinued flavours
The headstones of the discontinued flavours
The epitaphs
The headstones of the discontinued flavours
The headstones of the discontinued flavours
The headstones of the discontinued flavours
The headstones of the discontinued flavours
The headstones of the discontinued flavours

Since 1997

Real Vermont granite, and one epitaph per flavour.

The granite

Vermont has quarried it since the 19th century; the stones come from here.

Thirty and more

The number of retired flavours resting on the knoll.

The Rivian R1S on the way home
back to Granby the way home
05

Vermont Teddy Bear

Shelburne, south of Burlington
In 1981 John Sortino was sewing bears in his garage and selling them from a cart on Church Street. The first was called Bearcho — heavy eyebrows and a moustache, like Groucho Marx.

The workshop became a company, and in 1995 the company moved to Shelburne, a few kilometres south of Burlington. You can tour the factory: the bears are cut, sewn, stuffed and dressed in front of you. In the “Make a Friend for Life” room you choose your bear’s fur and stuffing, and it leaves with a birth certificate. The factory takes more than fifty thousand visitors a year.
The Shelburne factory
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The workshop
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The shop
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne
The Vermont Teddy Bear factory at Shelburne

A cart

Church Street, 1981

John Sortino sold the bears he sewed in his garage right there.

Shelburne

A few kilometres south of Burlington, between the lake and the fields.

The certificate

Every bear made on site leaves with its own birth certificate.

Since 1995

The company left Burlington for Shelburne.

Bearcho

Le premier, en 1981

Heavy eyebrows and a moustache: John Sortino sewed it for his son.

Make a Friend for Life

You pick the fur and the stuffing; the bear leaves with a birth certificate.

Fifty thousand

That is how many visitors the factory takes each year.

The lake nearby

Shelburne touches the eastern shore of Lake Champlain.

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