JACOB'S PILLOW

Jacob's Pillow is a dance center, school, and performance festival on a 220-acre National Historic Landmark campus in Becket, Massachusetts, in the Berkshires. Performance venues include the Ted Shawn Theatre (620 seats), the new Doris Duke Theatre (220-400 flexible seats), and the outdoor Henry J. Leir Stage. It is a recipient of the National Medal of Arts.

Jacob's Pillow presents America's longest-running international dance festival, running annually from late June through early August. Each season features more than 50 dance companies and over 500 free performances, talks, and events, attracting thousands of visitors from across the U.S. and abroad. Programming spans ballet, modern, contemporary, hip-hop, tap, and global dance traditions across the three performance spaces.

The property was purchased in 1931 by modern dance pioneer Ted Shawn as a dance retreat. The Ted Shawn Theatre was built in 1942 as the first theater in America designed specifically for dance. In 2003, the property was designated a National Historic Landmark District — the only dance entity in the U.S. to receive this honor. The Ted Shawn Theatre reopened in 2022 after extensive renovations, and a reimagined 20,000-square-foot Doris Duke Theatre (more than doubling its predecessor) opened in July 2025.