<http://schema.org/articleBody>
" The original 17th-century settlers of Charleston spent years exploring the southeastern coast of the U.S. looking for a spot to call home. But by 1680 they found this hospitable harbor, and tidy cobblestone streets soon took root, along with houses with inviting verandas designed to catch cooling breezes. More than three centuries later, the South Carolina city is still an ideal refuge. &amp;quot;I go every month,&amp;quot; says Eric Cohler, a Manhattan-based interior designer who bought a circa-1809 home here, complete with a hoopskirted ghost, a few years ago. &amp;quot;I just fell in love with the atmosphere, the people, the food\u2014the whole vibe.&amp;quot; Charleston&amp;#039;s romantic appeal is undeniable, its unique architecture surviving despite considerable damage incurred by wars, hurricanes, fires, and the massive earthquake of 1886. Downtown streets shaded by live oaks wafting Spanish moss and brightened by pink and white camellias host stately churches and antebellum mansions trimmed with lacy ironwork. From the pristine shores of Cape Romain National Wildlife Refuge to the thriving design district that has colonized once-downtrodden Upper King Street, Charlestonians are fiercely protective of the area&amp;#039;s natural and man-made beauty.  1 --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt;  --&amp;amp;gt; The Preservation Society of Charleston, established in 1920, is the nation&amp;#039;s oldest nonprofit organization of its kind and has successfully worked with city officials to safeguard thousands of historic structures. The efforts of that group help explain why this low-lying municipality, called the Holy City for its richly steepled skyline, is considered one of America&amp;#039;s most popular tourist destinations, and why last year Fortune magazine ranked it among the 100 best places to live. &amp;quot;There&amp;#039;s so much traditional taste in Charleston,&amp;quot; notes Neal Van Dalen, an architect responsible for many homes in I&amp;#039;On, an elegant New Urbanist neighborhood in Mount Pleasant, just across the Arthur Ravenel Jr. Bridge from Charleston. &amp;quot;But with the influx of people from out of town, you can feel an openness to more contemporary work.&amp;quot;  Much of the metropolitan region is a stunning swath of forested outcroppings, islands, and salt marshes tufted with spartina grass, so there&amp;#039;s water everywhere. The Battery, a famous promenade, rises just a few feet above the convergence of the Ashley and Cooper rivers, while Fort Sumter\u2014the city&amp;#039;s best-known site and where the first shots of the Civil War were fired\u2014sits on a sandbar in the harbor and can only be reached by ferry. Dry land, however, is where the real action takes place, as visitors gawk at the gumbo of Colonial, Georgian, Greek Revival, and Romanesque real estate.  At the top of the lengthy list of eminent properties open to the public is the Aiken-Rhett House, an urban relic largely unchanged, right down to the wallpaper, since 1858. Rather than embarking on an extensive restoration when it acquired the property in 1995, the Historic Charleston Foundation conserved the dilapidated interiors and eerie outbuildings as a time capsule. Visitors interested in the city&amp;#039;s evolution\u2014including its role as the fuse that ignited the Civil War and its painful Reconstruction period\u2014should browse the Charleston Museum. The oldest museum in America, it was founded in 1773 and brims with artifacts of daily life, including toys, clothing, and silver, many dating from before the Revolutionary War. Farther up the Ashley River the attractions include Middleton Place, Drayton Hall, and Magnolia Plantation and Gardens. Union soldiers burned the mansions at Magnolia and Middleton Place, but Drayton Hall survived unscathed. (It&amp;#039;s said that a report of smallpox and other serious contagions on the premises may have repelled the Yankee marauders.)  However, this history-conscious spot is not so bound to the past that its inhabitants\u2014 around 121,500, according to the latest estimate\u2014are hostile to newcomers with bold ideas. A few blocks southwest of the Charleston Museum lies the intersection of Calhoun and King streets, which marks the beginning of the design district, one of many renaissance projects currently underway. Calhoun long served as the line of demarcation between Lower King&amp;#039;s genteel, largely white shopping district and Upper King&amp;#039;s rougher-hewn zone of turn-of-the-century storefronts (many boarded up) and black-owned businesses. But around five years ago, drawn by low rents and a sense of mercantile adventure, new shops and restaurants began setting up amid fixtures like Super Bad Men&amp;#039;s clothing.   --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; 2 --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt;  --&amp;amp;gt; Linchpins of this movement are former Brooklynites Gustavo Serrano, a onetime editor at Stuff magazine, and his wife, Andrea, who recently opened sneaker boutique Suite Sole. Gustavo has also taken the lead in organizing Kulture Klash, a biannual event of art exhibitions, fashion shows, and concerts showcasing local talent. &amp;quot;There&amp;#039;s a lot of flavor in Charleston,&amp;quot; he says. &amp;quot;It&amp;#039;s not the same vibe as Miami or New York, but people have their own cool things going on.&amp;quot;  Among the Serranos&amp;#039; Upper King retail neighbors is Lulan Artisans, a clothing, fabric, and home-furnishings showroom with a specialty in Vietnamese products. &amp;quot;Seven years ago my husband, Jonathan, and I told our friends that we were moving to Charleston, and the reply was &amp;#039;Why the hell are you doing that?&amp;#039;&amp;quot; says Lulan&amp;#039;s owner, San Francisco transplant and ex-Hanoi resident Eve Blossom. &amp;quot;Now when I tell people in San Francisco where we live, they say, &amp;#039;My gosh, I was just there&amp;#039; or &amp;#039;My friends recently moved there from L.A.&amp;#039; West Coasters have taken notice.&amp;quot; Also on Upper King is Lesesne, a home boutique owned by architect Van Dalen&amp;#039;s wife, Bryte, a former regional coordinator for the French linen company Yves Delorme, and her mother, Barbara Lesesne; the shop does a brisk business in linens, handmade stationery, and Van Dalen&amp;#039;s modern furniture designs.  South of Calhoun, King Street is packed with popular destinations like the flagship boutique of celebrity handbag and shoe designer Mary Norton, along with chain stores such as Urban Outfitters, whose majestic Charleston location is well worth a visit\u2014it occupies the 1918 Garden Theater, a landmark silent-movie cinema and vaudeville house. But if your shopping tastes lean more toward museum-quality antiques, around King&amp;#039;s intersection with Broad Street are top venues like Geo. C. Birlant &amp;amp;amp; Co. In business since the 1920s, it is home to an exquisite array of aristocratic English furnishings dating from the 18th and 19th centuries.  As befits a city that takes pride in gracious living, from spring garden tours to refined hotels like the stately Wentworth Mansion, Charleston&amp;#039;s relationship with food is intense. Armchair gourmands abound, vigorously debating the merits of everything from variations in barbecue sauces to the proper consistency of creamy grits. Everyone cheered back in 2006 when the late epicure R. W. Apple Jr. wrote in The New York Times that Charleston rivaled New Orleans on the restaurant front. Three years later, the burners are still hot. As Eric Cohler says, &amp;quot;You can&amp;#039;t get a bad meal here, even if you tried.&amp;quot;   --&amp;amp;gt;   --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; 3 --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt;  --&amp;amp;gt; Hominy Grill&amp;#039;s Robert Stehling won the 2008 James Beard Foundation Award for best chef in the Southeast, and Sean Brock of McCrady&amp;#039;s Restaurant (a Cohler favorite) shook things up last year when he leased land on Wadmalaw Island and began growing vegetables for the restaurant; now he supplies some competitors too. Charleston native Darius Rucker, a country-music performer who is also lead singer of rock group Hootie &amp;amp;amp; the Blowfish, has a soft spot for Peninsula Grill, a top-rated eatery located in the deluxe Planters Inn. &amp;quot;The coconut cake is to die for,&amp;quot; says Rucker, who lives in Mount Pleasant. &amp;quot;My wife and I were there with friends recently and got one for the table and another to take home.&amp;quot; The quirky Riverland Terrace neighborhood on nearby James Island has some happening cuisine too. It&amp;#039;s the home of the recently renovated Savory Sushi and Catering, where Rhett Thomas dishes out rolls filled with local oysters, shrimp, produce, and pimento cheese, topped with inventive sauces.  On Saturdays from April to December, it seems much of Charleston, residents and tourists alike, heads to the farmers&amp;#039; market in Marion Square to sample organic fruits and vegetables and snap up works by local artists. From there you can wander down to the intersection of Meeting and Market streets and into the vast halls of Old City Market, a centerpiece of Charleston culture for 168 years. Its wares run the gamut from art and perfumes to T-shirts and baubles. One constant, though, are the basket weavers, most of them women who speak Gullah, a Creole dialect, and live in humble settlements established after the end of slavery. Their lineage and the design of the finely sewn baskets of braided sweetgrass they have made for centuries can be traced to the shores of western Africa. Just don&amp;#039;t think of the intricate but sturdy works as quaint souvenirs: One of the craft&amp;#039;s leading lights, the innovative Mary Jackson, received a $500,000 genius grant from the MacArthur Foundation last year. It&amp;#039;s just another example of how the traditions of the Holy City are attracting the world&amp;#039;s attention.  --&amp;amp;gt;   --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; 4 --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt;  --&amp;amp;gt;  ESSENTIAL CHARLESTON The area code is 843.  Be an art groupie. The internationally acclaimed Spoleto Festival USA (579-3100; spoletousa.org) dominates the city for 17 days each spring with modern-dance performances, opera recitals, jazz concerts, experimental theater, and more.  Pay your respects. Shaded by moss-draped oaks and abloom with roses, Charleston&amp;#039;s graveyards are startlingly pretty. Head to St. Philip&amp;#039;s Church (142 Church St., 722-7734; stphilipschurchsc.org) to see sentimental stone monuments to eminences like writer DuBose Heyward, whose novel Porgy was the basis of George Gershwin&amp;#039;s 1935 opera Porgy and Bess.  Horse around. One of the finest ways to experience downtown and its lovely streetscape is on an hourlong tour with Classic Carriage (853- 3747; classiccarriage.com).  WHAT TO SEE  Aiken-Rhett House, 48 Elizabeth St., 723-1159; historiccharleston.org: Carefully preserved in a romantic state of decay, this extraordinary antebellum mansion is a haunting time capsule of Charleston life in the 1800s.  Drayton Hall, 3380 Ashley River Rd., 769-2600; draytonhall.org: Considered one of the finest examples of 18th-century Italianate architecture in America. Fantastic gardens too.  Gibbes Museum of Art, 135 Meeting St., 722-2706; gibbesmuseum.org: Gorgeous paintings (Romare Bearden, Benjamin West) and classical sculptures join an engaging permanent collection of more than 10,000 objects and pieces of memorabilia from the city&amp;#039;s earliest days.  Heyward-Washington House, 87 Church St., 722-2996; charlestonmuseum.org: George Washington once stayed for a week in this remarkably restored downtown landmark, which is beautifully furnished with exceptional locally made pieces.  The Old Slave Mart Museum, 6 Chalmers St., 958-6467: Reopened in 2007 after a 20-year hiatus, this no-punches pulled museum examines Charleston&amp;#039;s history as a slave-trade hub through fascinating and often unsettling exhibits.  WHERE TO STAY  21 East Battery Bed &amp;amp;amp; Breakfast, 21 East Battery St., 556-0500; 21eastbattery.com: A charming waterfront inn located in an outbuilding of the 1825 Edmondston- Alston House (middletonplace.org).  Francis Marion Hotel, 387 King St., 722-0600; francismarioncharleston.com: This handsomely maintained grande dame has been offering gracious accommodations and nuanced service since 1924. The Inn at Middleton Place, 4290 Ashley River Rd., 556-0500; theinnatmiddletonplace.com: Stunning contemporary spot that&amp;#039;s eco-friendly too, with noted recycling and sustainable-practices programs.  Market Pavilion Hotel, 225 East Bay St., 723-0500; marketpavilion.com: In addition to plush rooms, this boutique hotel near the waterfront has the added attractions of a rooftop pool and a popular bar.  Planters Inn, 112 North Market St., 722-2345; plantersinn.com: A luxurious retreat in the heart of downtown&amp;#039;s historic district. On the premises is Peninsula Grill, one of Charleston&amp;#039;s most refined restaurants.  Vendue Inn, 19 Vendue Range, 577- 7970; vendueinn.com: Pet-friendly, antiques-bedecked boutique lodgings in the historic French Quarter.  WHERE TO EAT  Basil, 460 King St., 724-3490; eatatbasil.com: Incredibly fresh seafood and vegetables and a hip bar make this Thai spot a favorite.  Cru Caf\u00E9, 18 Pinckney St., 534-2434; crucafe.com: Chef John Zucker&amp;#039;s delightful bistro is tucked into a venerable house just off the main market. The poblano-mozzarella fried chicken is an outstanding variation on a regional standard.  Cypress, 167 East Bay St., 727-0111; magnolias-blossom-cypress.com: Donald Barickman serves innovative low-country dishes alongside a three-story glass-walled wine cellar.  Hominy Grill, 207 Rutledge Ave., 937- 0930; hominygrill.com: This cozy eatery is the perfect setting for chef Robert Stehling&amp;#039;s renowned comfort food. His mile-high biscuits, squash casserole, and shrimp creole are the stuff of local legend.  McCrady&amp;#039;s Restaurant, 2 Unity Alley, 577-0025; mccradysrestaurant.com: A private farm on Wadmalaw Island provides almost everything on chef Sean Brock&amp;#039;s menu, including organic heirloom tomatoes, broccoli, peas, and squash as well as the pork that goes into the homemade charcuterie.  Middleton Place Restaurant, 4300 Ashley River Rd., 266-7477; middletonplace.org: Recipes of the late, great cook Edna Lewis rule the delectable low-country menu (panfried quail; shrimp and grits).  Peninsula Grill, Planters Inn, 112 North Market St., 723-0700; peninsulagrill. com: Robert Carter&amp;#039;s fare (oyster stew; bourbon-grilled jumbo shrimp) is justifiably praised. Ditto the 11-layer coconut cake.  Savory Sushi and Catering, 1956B Maybank Hwy., James Island, 762- 3338; savorysushiandcatering.com: Excellent tapas and highly creative sushi rolls from chef Rhett Thomas.  T. W. Graham &amp;amp;amp; Co., 810 Pinckney St., McClellanville, 887-4342: Owner-chefs Claudia and Pete Kornack&amp;#039;s delectable shrimp hoagies and homemade pies attract area gourmands in droves to this picturesque Southern Gothic town 40 miles north of Charleston.  WHERE TO SHOP  Attic Treasures, 2024 Wappoo Dr., 762-0418: Antique dolls and turn-of-the-century furniture, from Victorian to Arts and Crafts.  Ben Silver, 149 King St., 577-4556; bensilver.com: For 25 years this \u00FCberpreppy fashion shop has purveyed its private-label clothing and gifts for men, women, and children. The emphasis is on classic fabrics such as seersucker, linen, and moleskin in smart colors; don&amp;#039;t miss the assortment of whimsical cuff links.  Elizabeth Stuart Design, 314 King St. 577-6272; esdcharleston.com: Elegant vintage furnishings, gorgeous fabrics, and mesmerizing jewelry.  Geo. C. Birlant &amp;amp;amp; Co., 191 King St., 722-3842; birlant.com: Tempting collectors since 1922 with 18th-century English furniture, dazzling silver, and sparkling chandeliers.  Lesesne, 539 King St., 853-3905; shoplesesne.com: Terrific linens and housewares share space with striking wood furniture by designer-craftsman Neal Van Dalen.  Mary Norton, 318 King St., 724-1081; marynorton.com: The flagship boutique of the Charleston-based handbag and shoe designer to the stars (Angela Bassett, Tina Fey, Teri Hatcher, Jennifer Lopez).  Old City Market, North and South Market streets, 577-6970; charlestoncity.info: A bazaar that&amp;#039;s been in operation on a more-or-less daily basis since the mid 1800s. Buy a handwoven sweetgrass basket, a regional specialty.  Terrace Oaks Antique Mall, 2037 Maybank Hwy., 795-9689; terraceoaksantiques.com: Ninety booths spread across 10,000 square feet\u2014whatever antique furnishing or collectible you are looking for, odds are it&amp;#039;s here.  --&amp;amp;gt;   --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; --&amp;amp;gt; 5  "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.elledecor.com/life-culture/travel/a1462/elle-decor-goes-to-charleston-56145/?src=shelter_footer>