300 Of The Most Amazing Gingerbread Cottages in America

I’ve been a fan of architecture ever since I lived on Manhattan’s Upper West Side in the mid-1980s. Although I don’t seek out architecture, it usually comes to me unexpectedly. That is exactly what happened on Martha’s Vineyard when I laid eyes on the gingerbread cottages.

Magical-Whimsical-Enchanting

I took an 8 day Collette Escorted Tour called The Islands of New England. On Martha’s Vineyard, we visited Circuit Avenue in Oak Bluffs. I could hardly believe my eyes. Gingerbread houses, the real thing, not the edible ones, lined the streets as far as the eye could see. I was so excited I didn’t know where to aim my camera first. As soon as I shot one photo, I saw five more beautiful photo ops. In the end, I just snapped photos until it was time to leave.

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Martha’s Vineyard

Martha’s Vineyard, a Massachusetts island, sits in the Atlantic just south of Cape Cod. Founded 1880, it consists of six towns: Aquinnah, Chilmark, Edgartown, Oak Bluffs, Tisbury, and West Tisbury.

Martha’s Vineyard became prominent in the 19th century by the whaling industry. At that time ships sailed around the world to hunt whales for their oil and blubber.

A longtime New England summer colony, Martha’s Vineyard encompasses harbor towns and lighthouses, sandy beaches and farmland. It’s accessible only by boat or air. Often simply called “The Vineyard”, it is a popular summer colony.

High-profile people, like Jackie Kennedy and 60 Minutes anchor Mike Wallace, have called the island home. Spike Lee, Meg Ryan, Diane Sawyer and Michael J. Fox are other stars who own homes on the Vineyard, while regular visitors include Barack and Michelle Obama, Bill and Hillary Clinton, Jake Gyllenhaal, Amy Schumer, Jennifer Lawrence, Larry David and Seth Meyers.

If you want to catch sight of a celebrity, this would be a good place to do it.

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African Americans and Oak Bluff

People of African descent first arrived at Martha’s Vineyard in the 1600s as enslaved West Africans who worked on the farms of European settlers. The Oak Bluffs harbor drew freed slaves, laborers, and sailors in the 18th century, and white locals sold them land.

Affluent African Americans from New York, Boston, and Washington came to Oak Bluffs. It was the only Martha’s Vineyard town that welcomed black tourists on the island until the 1960s.

By the 1930s, local black landowners were transforming the town into the country’s best-known and most exclusive African American vacation spot.

History of the Gingerbread Cottages

The Martha’s Vineyard Camp Meeting Association (MVCMA) grew out of the religious “camp meetings” of the 19th century. The first meeting took place on these grounds in 1835 with nine church tents and a crude speaker’s stand. From that modest one-half acre site in a “venerable grove of oaks,” the community has grown into a 34-acre area. Here, the famous iron Tabernacle towers over 300 privately owned picturesque gingerbread cottages. People still live today in this special community.

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The Tabernacle

A tabernacle is a meeting place for worship by some Protestants or Mormons.

At the heart of this community, the Tabernacle has been a hub for religious and cultural activities on the Island for over a century. In 1926 they added the great lighted cross to the top of Tabernacle. It towers above as a “Beacon to All”.

It is an inclusive community welcoming participation from year-round and summer residents, and visitors of all faiths. As such, it supports the Martha’s Vineyard Camp Meeting Association mission – “To perpetuate our religious and historical heritage, engaging all in education and spiritual growth in a welcoming faith community.”

IN 2005, the Martha’s Vineyard Camp Meeting Association obtained national historic landmark status.

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Gingerbread Cottage Architecture

Gingerbread is an architectural style that consists of elaborately detailed embellishment known as gingerbread trim. It is more specifically used to describe the work of American designers in the late 1860s and 1870s.

It is characterized by peaked roofs, front porches with paper doll balusters and scroll-like details that look like you could break them off and eat them.

There are over 300 of these cottages standing and lived in today on Martha’s Vineyard. Known as “Gingerbread Houses or Cottages” due to their intricate, “carpenter’s Gothic” architecture, they have become one of the biggest draws for tourists to Oak Bluffs.

The Gingerbread Cottages of Oak Bluffs

These vibrant Victorian cottages are clustered together, each with a quaint and colorful design reminiscent of the house made of gingerbread and candy in “Hansel and Gretel.” These adorable homes are now exclusive summer cottages, but they come from humble origins.  

In the 1800s, a group of Methodists frequented this corner of the island They held annual religious retreats and meetings on Martha’s Vineyard. At the time, they slept in tents during these summer gatherings, but as the camp meetings became more frequent the group built permanent cottages to accommodate them year-round.

The name of the original cluster of 500 cottages was “Cottage City,” until it became Oak Bluffs in 1880. These individually decorated cottages, painted with bright and vivid colors with candy-like pillars and ornaments, became known as the “gingerbread houses.” 

Today, over 300 gingerbread houses remain in the Oak Bluffs Campground. The Cottage Museum at the entrance to the village features a prototype cottage furnished as it would have looked in the 1800s. The tabernacle sits in the center of the complex, which still functions as a religious gathering place.

Grand Illumination

For one special night, residents of the Campground place ornate Chinese lanterns (some electric, some still lit with just a candle), around each Gingerbread Cottage. The lanterns remain dark until after dusk. At an appointed hour, people gather in the Tabernacle for a sing-along and community gathering. At the end, all the lights go out and thousands of Chinese and Japanese lanterns spring to life in a brilliant cascade of light throughout the campground. The celebration ends after visitors walk through the Campground enjoying the sights and sounds of an event taken straight from the mid-1800s.

When to Visit the Gingerbread Cottages

The best time to visit is in the summertime, as the sun will make the houses look even brighter and more vivid.  There is no admission fee to walk through the campground, and photography is allowed from the sidewalk. The Cottage Museum is open from mid-May to mid-October with a $3 admission fee.

Find the Gingerbread Cottages

The Gingerbread Cottages are sometimes a little tricky to find.  The formal name is the Martha’s Vineyard Camp Meeting Association, also known as The Campgrounds although no one camps there anymore.

You can access The Campground from either Circuit Avenue or Lake Avenue through various entry points, some marked by charming wrought iron arches that spell out “MVCMA” on either side.

Parking is limited, but the MVCMA is a short (2-5 minute) walk from the Oak Bluffs harbor area where the ferries and public buses arrive.

Want to Live Here?

The largest of the cottages is only 1000 sq. ft. and most are only 700 sq. ft. They start at $400k and owners must occupy the property for part of the year.

The famous “Pink Cottage” is for sale at $635,000. At 787 square feet, it has 2 bedrooms and 2 baths.  

If you would rather rent, weekly rentals start at $1900.