Sat, Nov 14
The Move
Where should you go?
We picked our favorites from over 2,000 Boston places. Tell us what you’re up for and we’ll recommend up to three.
Meetups
Screenings, watch parties and nights out with Secret Boston.
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Sports & social
Morning Touchdown with Secret Boston
Sun, Nov 15, 2026 9:30 AM – 1:00 PM
Time Out Market Boston
Watch the game with Secret Boston. You don't need to be a sports person, but we love those too. Come to meet people, root for the Pats or spend the morning with some fellow fans.
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Social
Wharf Social with Secret Boston
Thu, Nov 19, 2026 6:00 PM – 8:00 PM
Night Shift Brewing, Lovejoy Wharf
Cocktails on the wharf with your current and future favorite IG handles. Put faces to usernames and have a little pre-holiday fun.
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SECRET BOSTON MEETUP
Tweed Night at The Haven
Tue, Dec 8, 2026 6:00 PM – 8:00 PM
The Haven
Trade the inbox for a proper Scottish pub. Come solo or bring a friend and put some faces to the Secret Boston crew.
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Upcoming events in Boston
Sun, Nov 15
system_failure presents: Introspekt
2:00–10:00 PM
Fri, Nov 20
Somerville Ciné-Club Presents: SpliceTape #1 at Aeronaut
7:30–9:30 PM
Aeronaut Brewing Company · Somerville
Wed, Nov 25
Get more out of Secret Boston
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See what members getPlaces to go
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Somaek Korean
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Aeronaut Brewing Company
- Casual
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Josephine
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Waypoint
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Guides
Secret Boston shop gift guide: from a $16 CITGO sign ornament to a $128 hoodie
Every product in this guide is an original Secret Boston design. The Christmas collections come right after the gifts that don’t ship, then the stocking stuffers, then Wicked Good for the rest of the year. The physical gifts are made to order when you buy them, and delivery time varies by product (the luxe hoodies take about 9 to 11 days in the US), so check each product page before you count on a date. Shipping is free on US orders over $50. Want to see what other Boston makers are up to? Our Boston craft fairs guide has every holiday market through Christmas, and these 10 shops selling stuff you totally don't need are perfect for the hard-to-shop-for. And if anyone at the party says Boston has always loved Christmas, you can tell them about the time Boston once banned Christmas. The gifts that don’t ship Shopping late, or for the person who already owns every Boston hoodie? Give them a year of Secret Boston Members for $99. Tell us who it’s for, and we’ll email them on the day you choose. It’s paid once, and nothing renews. Can’t pick a size? The shop gift card comes in $25, $50 or $100 and arrives by email. Secret Boston gift membership $99 A full year of Members. Paid once, and it arrives by email on the day you choose. Give a membership Secret Boston Shop Gift Card $25, $50 or $100 Good for anything in the shop, delivered by email. Shop it Boston Ugly Christmas Our loudest holiday collection: BOSTON knit across the front, with the CITGO sign and the T worked into the pattern. The crewneck (from $50, navy or white) runs small, so order one size up, and there’s a navy tee from $28 for the party where the heat is cranked. Boston Ugly Christmas Hoodie From $52 BOSTON across the chest of a navy hoodie, with cream snowflakes and trees. Made for the office party, the tree lighting and the bar after. Shop it Boston Ugly Christmas Beanie, T and CITGO $33 The T in the first O and the CITGO sign in the second, in red and green on a white cuffed beanie. Shop it Boston Ugly Christmas Beanie $33 BOSTON and two snowflakes on the cuff. White on navy, or red on white. Shop it Boston Ugly Christmas Pom-Pom Hat $33 BOSTON and two snowflakes in white on a navy pom-pom hat. Shop it Classic Ugly Christmas The same snowflakes and trees, with the T and the CITGO sign in the middle row and no words at all. Beyond these two beanies, it comes on a navy hoodie (from $52), a crewneck in navy or white (from $50, order one size up), a navy tee (from $28) and a pom-pom hat ($33). Classic Ugly Christmas Premium Beanie $38 Black organic cotton in a snug ribbed knit, embroidered in white. The step up from the cuffed beanie. Shop it Classic Ugly Christmas Beanie $33 The CITGO sign, a snowflake and the T on the cuff. White on navy, or red and green on white. Shop it Wicked Good Christmas Have yourself a Wicked Good Christmas. The script is embroidered on the luxe and premium hoodies and printed in red and green on the rest, including a tee from $28. Wicked Good Christmas Luxe Hoodie From $128 Our heaviest hoodie: 15 oz brushed fleece, 80% organic cotton and 20% recycled polyester with an organic cotton face, embroidered in red on stone or black. It comes in European sizes, so order one size up. Shop it Wicked Good Christmas Premium Embroidered Hoodie From $98 A 10 oz oversized hoodie. Red thread on cream, or the original red and green on white. Shop it Wicked Good Christmas Hoodie From $52 Printed in red and green on ash or white. Shop it Wicked Good Christmas Beanie $33 Embroidered in red and green on a white cuffed beanie. Shop it Stocking stuffers The metal ornaments are $16, printed on both sides in round or bell, with a red ribbon. The wrapping paper also comes as a set of three sheets in red, forest green and navy for $22. Boston Ugly Christmas Ornament $16 BOSTON across the middle, with the CITGO sign and the T in the pattern. Shop it Classic Ugly Christmas Ornament $16 Snowflakes and trees with the T and the CITGO sign. No words, just the pattern. Shop it Wicked Good Christmas Ornament $16 White with red and green script on one side, red with white on the other. Shop it Boston Ugly Christmas Wrapping Paper From $19 BOSTON on repeat with the CITGO sign and the T, in three roll lengths up to 15 feet. Shop it Wicked Good, all year The way Boston says it, without the Christmas, so it gets worn long after December. There’s also a premium embroidered hoodie (from $98) and a classic tee (from $28). Wicked Good Luxe Hoodie From $128 The same 15 oz fleece, 80% organic cotton and 20% recycled polyester, boxy and slightly cropped. Black thread on stone, white on black, and order one size up. Shop it Wicked Good Hoodie From $52 Red on ash, white on navy. Shop it Wicked Good Premium Heavyweight T-Shirt From $42 Garment-dyed Comfort Colors cotton, in ivory, grey, navy or black. Shop it Wicked Good Premium Beanie $38 Ribbed organic cotton with the script in white, in black, Oxford navy or light grey. Shop it Wicked Good Beanie $33 Embroidered in white on a black or navy cuffed beanie. Shop it Wicked Good Rope Cap $38 Black with a white rope, or white with a black rope. Shop it
10 best rooftop bars in Boston
Some rooftops call for a reservation and proper shoes. Others call for a burrito. Boston has room for both, along with a brewery greenhouse, a North End roof deck and hotel bars where the harbor does much of the work. Our picks for rooftop bars in Boston include two across the river in Harvard Square. Choose by the kind of evening you want, then confirm that the roof itself is open. A restaurant downstairs can be serving dinner while its outdoor bar is closed for weather or a private party. Felipe’s brings the rooftop down to earth with tacos, burritos and margaritas in Harvard Square. Order something from the wood grill, which cooks chicken, steak and vegetables over hardwood, and take advantage of the seasonal rooftop patio. The drinks use hand-squeezed key lime juice. Come here when you want a casual meal with your drinks, rather than a hotel lounge and a separate dinner reservation. The restaurant’s late hours do not guarantee the roof stays open equally late. Deck 12 sits above the Seaport at YOTEL, with indoor and outdoor seating and views toward downtown and the waterfront. That gives you more flexibility than an entirely exposed roof. It serves evening food during the week and offers weekend brunch, making it an option before a night out or earlier in the day. Reservations are strongly encouraged; choose the time and seating you want rather than arriving at sunset and hoping for the best. Rooftop at The Envoy faces the harbor from Sleeper Street, with lounge seating, fire pits and cocktails above the Seaport. It is a good choice when the view is the main reason you are going. The hotel recommends reservations and accepts limited walk-ins. Outdoor arrangements change with the season, including winter enclosures, so look at the specific experience you are booking. Para Maria, the hotel’s restaurant, is a separate reservation. Daedalus is the Harvard Square choice for a roof-deck dinner with a proper plate of food. The menu includes mushroom risotto, steak frites, shrimp linguine and a bacon-cheddar burger, alongside cocktails, wine and draught beer. Its Mount Auburn Street location puts you a short walk from Harvard Yard. The restaurant currently serves dinner Monday through Saturday and closes Sundays, so do not build a Sunday brunch plan around an old listing. Contessa is the dressier option at the top of The Newbury, overlooking the Public Garden and Back Bay. The room was designed by Ken Fulk, and the menu follows Northern Italian cooking, with dishes such as ricotta gnudi and tortellini in brodo. The bar serves Negronis and Martinis, with an extensive Italian and French wine selection. Think of this as a rooftop restaurant where you can have a drink, rather than a casual open-air beer deck. Reserve if dinner is part of the plan. Mia is the roof deck inside Umbria on Hanover Street, serving cocktails and appetizers intended for sharing. It gives a North End evening somewhere to continue after dinner, but it requires more planning than simply walking upstairs. Mia is reservation-only and 21-plus, with a dress code that excludes hats, sandals, shorts and athletic wear. Book Mia specifically, since a table at Umbria and a roof-deck reservation are different things. The Overlook occupies the third floor of Legal Sea Foods Harborside, with a broad view across Boston Harbor. This is the rooftop to consider when you want seafood as well as drinks: the setting puts the water directly in front of you, rather than somewhere beyond a wall of buildings. Legal’s three floors have different uses, including a separate private-event level, so confirm that your booking is for The Overlook. Rooftop@Revere has lounge furniture, an outdoor bar and private cabanas above the Theater District. Its view takes in Back Bay, making it an option for drinks before or after plans downtown. The venue strongly encourages reservations on busy evenings and weekends, and even hotel guests are subject to capacity. If you want a cabana, check that booking’s terms separately. A casual table for two and a reserved cabana are different commitments. Cunard Tavern’s roof deck, The Layover, brings a walk-up bar and harbor views to East Boston. The menu leans toward tropical drinks, including rum cocktails, with beer, wine and food available as well. The roof deck has its own schedule, distinct from the dining room. Public service is seasonal, while private events can use the space year-round. Confirm rooftop availability before crossing over for it, especially outside the warmer months. Dorchester Brewing Company has the Hopservatory, a four-season rooftop greenhouse that lets you keep the upstairs plan when the weather turns. The brewery serves its own beers alongside cider, wine, cocktails and nonalcoholic options, with food from M&M BBQ. You can also visit the Museum of Bad Art inside the building for free. Beer, barbecue and a gallery visit make a fairly complete afternoon without requiring a second address. When booking, select the rooftop or ask the venue to confirm it. A general restaurant reservation does not necessarily buy you a seat upstairs. Check any minimum spend, cancellation terms and weather policy before paying a deposit. If the forecast sends you indoors, our Boston speakeasy guide has another set of places to settle in for a drink.
Get to know Boston
What the colors of the Zakim Bridge lights mean
Green on the Zakim does not automatically mean the Celtics. Purple does not have one permanent meaning either. The Zakim Bridge lights change for holidays, memorials, and awareness campaigns, and the same color can stand for several unrelated things in a single year. MassDOT publishes a dated lighting calendar. Match the night to the entry, check that the Zakim is one of the bridges listed, and you have a better answer than guessing from the color alone. That last part matters. The state schedules several bridges on the same page. An entry for the Longfellow or the Braga is not automatically an entry for the Zakim. Where to check the Zakim Bridge lights The MassDOT bridge lighting schedule lists the occasion, color, date, and participating bridges. Use the current year, especially if the photo you are looking at has been reposted without a date. The 2026 calendar is a useful demonstration of why a universal color key would fail. Green has already been used for St. Patrick’s Day, Boston Legacy Football Club, and Living Donation Week. Blue has appeared for World Parkinson’s Day and for the twenty-fifth anniversary of September 11. Those are not competing theories. They are different nights. A blue bridge photographed in April cannot explain a blue bridge photographed in September. Two September nights this year make the point. On September 11 the Zakim was blue. On September 13 it was green, and that night the Zakim was the only bridge on the list. Same week. Different colors. Different reasons. Multi-color displays can be easier to tell apart, though the date still matters. The schedule names combinations as well as single colors. Read the full line before attaching a meaning to a picture, particularly when the occasion is a memorial or a health campaign. Who gets to decide MassDOT’s bridge lighting policy, dated November 14, 2023, says special displays express the agency’s official views. The bridges are not a public billboard and not an open platform for anyone’s message. A change needs approval from the department’s Office of the General Counsel and the transportation secretary’s concurrence. The policy covers state and federal holidays, other national observances, and public commemorations and celebrations at the national, state, or local level. The calendar can still move after that approval. A screenshot is useful evidence of an earlier plan. The live page is the better place to check what is scheduled now. The Zakim is one of several state bridges with programmable lights. The policy also names the Longfellow, Fore River, Kenneth F. Burns, and Braga bridges. Matching colors across the state can be one coordinated observance, not a coincidence. Why blue looks familiar Blue is also the bridge’s ordinary night look. Color Kinetics, which worked with MassDOT on the LED system, describes the design as blue-lit towers with the cables picked out in white. The company cites architect Miguel Rosales, who wanted a formal entrance to Boston. The LED system was unveiled in December 2012. It replaced older metal halide lights that had been on the bridge since it opened in 2002 and had grown dim. The new fixtures can hold the familiar blue or shift for a listed occasion. The lighting is not a new coat of paint. It is a programmed change. Blue by itself is therefore not enough to identify a tribute. Check whether a special blue display was on the calendar for that night before assigning it a meaning. Read the date before the symbolism For an old photograph, establish the date before looking up the color. For a night you have not seen yet, check the calendar again close to the date. If the page has no matching entry for the Zakim, leave the occasion unconfirmed rather than borrowing one from another month or another bridge. The fastest route to the answer is the least dramatic: date, bridge name, calendar line. Boston has other lights with a code, including the weather beacon on the old Hancock. This one usually comes with a schedule.
Why Bostonians say “wicked” so much
“Wicked good” is a compliment. “Wicked expensive” is a complaint. The same word does both jobs without any concern for whether the subject deserves praise. In Boston, “wicked” often means very or extremely. It turns up the volume on whatever comes next. Say someone is wicked tired and you mean they are very tired, not that they have become a worse person. The meaning comes from how the word is being used. That is the useful thing to know before attempting a Boston impression. You can pronounce every R and still use the word correctly. You can also drop every R and put “wicked” in a sentence where it sounds like you learned to speak from a souvenir sweatshirt. Why Bostonians say wicked before almost anything In this usage, “wicked” is an intensifier. Merriam-Webster records its adverbial meaning alongside the older adjective meaning morally bad. The two uses can occupy the same language without confusion. A wicked person and a wicked good sandwich are different propositions. Think of “wicked cold,” “wicked funny” or “wicked crowded.” The word strengthens the description. It does not tell you whether to like the thing being described. Someone saying the restaurant was wicked busy might be recommending it, explaining a long wait, or wishing they had stayed home. The placement is more important than putting on an accent. “That was wicked good” has the familiar local construction. “That was wicked,” meaning excellent, is another slang use, but it does a different grammatical job. Adding the word everywhere will not make every sentence sound more Boston. The Puritans do not get automatic credit Boston’s reputation makes an origin story involving stern Puritans tempting. But the fact that an old word existed in England does not prove that seventeenth-century settlers brought this particular local use with them. The language program A Way with Words discusses “wicked” as a New England intensifier. That regional association is useful. It does not supply the name of the first person who said it, or a neat date when everyone in Massachusetts agreed to start. There is no need to invent a founding ceremony. People repeat words they hear in their families and communities, and a familiar expression can feel entirely ordinary to one speaker and immediately regional to another. “Wicked” works perfectly well without a colonial certificate of authenticity. Ordering a frappe does not require dropping an R Other local words need a little more translation. A frappe is a thick milkshake; the familiar New England pronunciation rhymes with “cap.” The spelling can make visitors expect a different word, especially if they are thinking of a coffee drink. For an order, the menu is more useful than a debate over terminology. Ask what is in the drink if the distinction matters. Regional vocabulary is interesting until it becomes the reason you receive something other than the ice cream you wanted. “Bubbler” means a drinking fountain, with a history that reaches beyond Massachusetts. Our bubbler explainer separates the regional word from a frequently repeated manufacturing story. Calling it a water fountain is also a perfectly effective way to ask for water. Vocabulary is not the same as an accent The Boston accent concerns sounds: which R’s a speaker pronounces, what happens between words, and how vowels are formed. Vocabulary concerns the words chosen. They overlap in conversation, but one does not require the other. A person raised here might say “wicked” constantly, occasionally, or never. Another might arrive from elsewhere and pick it up. Neither case is a useful citizenship test. Boston contains more than one way of speaking, and ordinary conversation is less uniform than the movie version. If the word is new to you, listen to what follows it. Good, bad, fast, slow, cheap, expensive: the next word does the describing. “Wicked” just makes sure you heard.