#catskills

#catskills

The grocery store came first, before the house, the husband, the baby. When the chef and cookbook author Alison Roman closed on the building that would become First Bloom, her debut retail venture, in the Catskills town of Bloomville, New York, it was a local pizza parlor. The store's opening, in 2023, marked a moment when Romanwho chronicles her life and cooking for a million-odd followers across Instagram, YouTube, and Substackneeded something for herself.

The Catskills have always been a retreat-first for 19th-century painters and writers, later for city escapees chasing mountain air and summer swims. That legacy hasn't faded, but the region feels freshly alive these days as chefs, artists, and creative entrepreneurs put down roots. Farm-to-table restaurants, craft breweries and cideries, and design-driven boutique hotels now coexist with retro diners, antique shops, and historic inns-many of which have been newly restored.

The fan of the landslide, where a surge of boulders and mud blasted the forest open after rushing down the steeper slopes of Arizona Mountain in the Catskills, is about 100 feet widean undulating plane of rocks, mangled tree trunks, and invasive plants such as Japanese stiltgrass that thrive in disturbed areas. On a hot July day the seasonal stream that runs through this ravine, named the Shingle Kill, is small enough to step over.

Hannah Cohen's recent album, Earthstar Mountain, is inspired by her move to the Catskill Mountains, blending timelessness with modernity in its sound.