Nevertheless, the state has an important pattern of evenly dispersed villages and small but complete urban centers of distinctive character. The largest city, Burlington, has only 42,417 residents, and 67 percent of the state's population lives in communities of fewer than 2,500 people. With 625,741 people, according to the 2010 census, in an area of 9,615 square miles, Vermont is one of the nation's smallest states. A native frugality and conservatism, in combination with a relatively slow-paced economy that accommodated development through addition and adaptation rather than replacement, have left a remarkably unchanged Vermont that conserves records and lessons about things that America may have lost elsewhere, but still remembers. As such, Vermont presents a microcosm of American building history with structures and patterns that have had countless counterparts beyond its boundaries. Its rich stew of styles and types has drawn on many sources-immigrant traditions, publications, imported designs-to serve a full range of purposes. Through a long history spanning much of the American experience, the state has been in the mainstream.
This book looks beyond the stereotypes to document the remarkable quality, humanity, and persistence of the state's built landscape, but not necessarily its uniqueness. However appealing, this travel-brochure image does little justice to the architectural richness of a place that retains so dense and comprehensive a variety of building types, landscapes, and historic environments that the state has been proclaimed a “unique” world destination by National Geographic Traveler and designated a national historic treasure by the National Trust for Historic Preservation. The Green Mountain State's popular image epitomizes New England-handsome barns overlooking grazing cows in rolling pastures, white country churches punctuating hillsides of blazing maples, and small villages clustering around gracious greens. Vermont is small, but noteworthy in excess of its size, and significant beyond its well-known stereotypes.
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