About Chapel Hill
Discover Chapel Hill – “The Southern Part of Heaven”
Chapel Hill was named after the New Hope Chapel, which stood upon a hill at the crossing of two primary roads. Chapel Hill is nicknamed “the Southern Part of Heaven” and is best known as the home of the University of North Carolina, our nation’s first state university. Along Franklin Street, the town’s center of activity, visitors will find foods to please every palate, specialty shops for the most discriminating shopper and a variety of nightlife. Below is a list of popular local attractions. Please visit http://www.chocvb.org/ to learn more about the beautiful town of Chapel Hill.
University of North Carolina Campus: The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill is the first state-supported university in America, which was chartered in 1789. The 729-acre campus is now part of a 16-unit statewide system and has an enrollment of 27,000 students, with a 3,100-member faculty. It is both beautiful and historic.
Franklin Street Downtown Chapel Hill: Sports Illustrated has said that Chapel Hill is the best college town in America, and Franklin Street (named after Benjamin Franklin) is one reason why. With more than 300 diverse businesses, "Franklin Street" is the heart of town, where the famous have walked, the famous and not-so-famous have celebrated great sports victories and many more have been entertained simply by strolling its length to see and be seen.
A Southern Season Gourmet Emporium: What started out as a tiny coffee roastery in 1975 has grown into a 60,000-sq.ft. landmark gourmet food and kitchen accessories marketplace that New York Times food critic Craig Claiborne referred to as "wall to wall and floor to ceiling, a visual and gustatory delight."
Carr Mill Mall & Weaver Street Market: Carrboro is the kind of small southern town where the past and the present seem to be fused together. Weaver Street Market is the heart of Carrboro. It's the place to gather, to meet, to shop. Fittingly, it's just in front of the old Carr Mill building, a relic from an industrial past, in the present serving as a shopping mall full of eclectic stores. Down the street, The ArtsCenter is one-stop-shopping for anything about the arts. Next-door is the Cat's Cradle, the institution that helped the area earn its designation as the "next Seattle" when it comes to the music scene.
Historic Hillsborough: Hillsborough, just fifteen miles from Chapel Hill, has more than 100 late 18th century and early 19th century buildings including the beautifully restored Ayr Mount Historic Site (c.1815); the Old County Courthouse (1844), cited by the Library of Congress as one of the finest Greek Revival structures; and the Orange County Historical Museum. Hillsborough was the scene of many important events during the Revolutionary and Civil War periods, and home to a signer of the Declaration of Independence. Today, Hillsborough is a writers' colony that boasts many award winners. Here you'll also find flea market treasures, unique jewelry and home goods stores, gourmet restaurants, coffee shops and pastoral views.
Dean E. Smith Center, Home of the Tar Heels: The Tar Heel basketball team has produced famous players and garnered numerous championships and awards over the years while playing under the roofs of Carmichael Auditorium and the Dean E. Smith Center, completed in 1986. The structure is only one of 14 facilities that make up the Tar Heel athletics program, comprised of 26 separate sports.
Playmakers Repertory Company and memorial Hall: Founded in 1919, PlayMakers is North Carolina's premier not-for-profit professional theatre company, performing five different plays from October to May in its intimate Paul Green Theatre on the UNC campus. In addition, the new Memorial Hall, built in 1885, rebuilt in 1931 and renovated in 2005 at a cost of $18-million, hosts world-renowned performers, events and elegant ceremonies. Other popular performance venues include the Cat's Cradle and The ArtsCenter in Carrboro, plus many small nightclubs. In fact, the Squirrel Nut Zippers, Superchunk, Archers of Loaf, James Taylor, Southern Culture on the Skids and Ben Folds Five are among the notable musical acts whose careers began in Chapel Hill.
North Carolina Botanical Garden: The largest botanical garden in the southeast, established in 1966, consists of nearly 700 acres of preserved land with nature trails, carnivorous plant collections, aquatics and herb gardens, and revolving exhibits of artwork with a horticultural theme. The garden also administers the historic Coker Arboretum, established in 1903, and the recently upgraded 93-acre Battle Park, established in the late 1800s by University President Kemp Plummer Battle, known as "the Southern Thoreau."
Ackland Art Museum: The museum has a collection of more than 15,000 objects that broadly covers the history of European painting and sculpture, including masters such as Rubens, Delacroix, Degas and Pissarro, and is strong in Asian art and works on paper, with some North Carolina pottery and folk art.
Nearly 300 Restaurants, Bars and Nightclubs: Orange County has one of the largest concentrations of diverse, multi-ethnic restaurants, eating places, bars, breweries, lounges, nightclubs, pubs and sports bars in the country.