Adirondack Experience , located on NY-30 in the hamlet of Blue Mountain Lake in Hamilton County, New York, is a museum dedicated to preserving the history of the Adirondacks. The museum is located on the site of an historic summer resort hotel, the Blue Mountain House, built high above Blue Mountain Lake in 1876 by Miles Tyler Merwin, that operated until the late 1940s. The museum consists of 23 buildings, 121 acres, and 60,000 square feet of exhibition space. The opening of a brand new 19,000 square foot exhibition, Life in the Adirondacks, took place July 2017.
Adirondack Experience is open late-May to mid-October.
The museum's collections include historic artifacts, photographs, indigenous arts, archival materials, and fine art documenting the region's past in twenty-four buildings including historic structures and contemporary galleries. The museum offers special events, traditional workshops, demonstrations by artisans-in-residence, and school field trips . The museum contains a research library which is accessible year-round; its publication program has produced 65 books of Adirondack history, art histories, and museum catalogs.
