Southwest® flights to Manchester, NH starting at $79

Straddling the Merrimack River in the southern part of the state, Manchester offers plenty of charming tuckpointed cityscape to take in on both banks. Having first built a canal system at the city’s scenic Amoskeag Falls, Samuel Blodgett, the city’s founder, then followed through on his plans to build an industrial powerhouse modeled after Manchester, England. While it’s now no longer the textile hub of Blodgett’s day, Manchester remains the largest New England city outside of Boston. Trading textiles for tech startups, the Queen City’s quaint red-brick buildings have been transformed from homes of industry into purveyors of cultural intrigue and cutting-edge cuisine.

Supported by its lively student population, the city is host to a burgeoning arts scene. Trend-setting new galleries and performance spaces dot the downtown districts, but it’s actually a couple of old stalwarts that remain the center of the action. Founded in 1914, the Palace Theatre has featured the likes of Harry Houdini and the Marx Brothers. Today, it’s still in stunning condition and attracts acts of the highest caliber from around the world. Before you catch a nighttime show, though, be sure to stop by the city’s celebrated Currier Museum of Art. Inaugurated not long after the Palace, this humble-in-size museum has long held an outsized collection of treasures. Stop in to see significant works from European giants like Picasso, Monet, and Matisse as well as crucial American Modernists like Georgia O’Keeffe and Alexander Calder. Catering to architecture and design aficionados too, the museum also offers tours of the nearby Zimmerman House—the only Frank Lloyd Wright-designed home open to the public in all of New England.