Back Bay

Posh shopping and dining in an historic neighborhood
Noteworthy for: Numerous stores cater to affluent patrons with luxe tastes, though shops for more modest budgets are also present.

Fashionable Back Bay, with its imposing brownstones, leafy promenades, and gleaming towers, mostly draws visitors for its concentrated shopping area.
Tree-lined Newbury Street presents a genteel row of upscale stores such as Cartier, Chanel, and Burberry on one end, transmuting down the way to stores like Madewell and Urban Outfitters on the other end. Plenty of art galleries, specialty boutiques, and precious sidewalk cafes dot the street. A few blocks away are Copley Place, with ritzy shops in an enclosed shopping mall, and the Prudential Center, with more typical mall offerings and dining options.

For history and architectural beauty, explore the nearby Trinity Church, a national historic landmark, and across from it, the grand Renaissance Revivalist Boston Public Library, with its own gallery of John Singer Sargent murals.