Eastworks is a five-story brick mill at 116 Pleasant Street in Easthampton, reborn since the late 1990s as a mixed-use hub of artist studios, small businesses, government and nonprofit offices, restaurants, and live-work loft apartments. At roughly 500,000 square feet, it is the anchor of Easthampton’s broader mill district along the Lower Mill Pond and Manhan River.
The first three floors went up in 1908 for the West Boylston Manufacturing Company, a textile firm that added two more floors in 1920 before moving its operation south a few years later. The building passed through several industrial owners, including General Electric and, from the 1950s on, Stanley Home Products, the cleaning-supplies and cosmetics company famous for its home parties. Will and Paula Bundy bought the building from Stanley Home in 1997 and have run the conversion ever since.
Today the ground floor and upper floors house a rotating mix of tenants: painters, graphic designers, sculptors, writers, makers, small offices, a cafe and restaurant, and event space. Tenant rosters turn over from year to year, so the official directory is the best place to check what’s currently open to the public.
Visiting
Common areas are open during business hours; individual studios and shops keep their own schedules. Eastworks also hosts periodic open studios events when artists throw their doors open to the public, a good time to wander the long mill corridors and see the building from the inside. There’s a large lot on Pleasant Street and the Manhan Rail Trail runs nearby.