Outside an antique shop in historic downtown Northfield, Minnesota.
NORTHFIELD RATES AS ONE of my favorite Minnesota cities. It’s a charming/quaint/picturesque river town with a timeless small town feel.
Photographed through the front window of Quality Bakery, a snippet of the bakery’s holiday window display.
Signage directs families to Santa’s house in Bridge Square.
The Christmas tree in Bridge Square brightens the wintry landscape with bold red decorations.
For someone like me who prefers rural to urban, a 22-minute drive there with no traffic hassles, visual delights in a historic downtown, an artsy vibe (including sidewalk poetry) and more, make this college city of some 20,000 particularly appealing. Especially at Christmas.
Bridge Square in the heart of downtown Northfield.
An ornament on that community Christmas tree.
Santa’s house, where Santa has always been absent whenever I’ve stopped at Bridge Square.
Fancied up holiday window displays, a Santa House and Christmas tree in Bridge Square (the downtown community gathering spot), an annual Christmas Walk, the renowned St. Olaf College Christmas Concert and more transform Northfield into a magical place during the holiday season.
I recently spent some time Christmas shopping in the downtown made famous by The James-Younger Gang’s robbery of the First National Bank on September 7, 1876. Today that bank building houses the Northfield Historical Society. The museum sits right across the street from Bridge Square.
A wagon load of Wisemen awaits shoppers outside an antique shop.
It’s not that I like shopping—I don’t. But I’d rather shop in one-of-a-kind local shops than in Anywhere Mall, USA. Northfield offers an abundance of home-grown retail stores.
There’s a lot of creativity in Northfield. And an appreciation of that creativity. I once participated in a beer poetry reading at a local brewery. How cool is that?
Beau inside Marketplace @ 416.
Christmas or not, the Americana small town-ness of Northfield endears this river town to me.
TELL ME: Have you been to Northfield and, if so, what about it appeals to you? Or what town do you find especially charming wherever you live?
© Copyright 2018 Audrey Kletscher Helbling
