Business and leisure travelers consider The City of Brotherly Love the ideal destination to commemorate our nation’s 250-year quest toward a “more perfect union.” A multitude of year-long events, exhibitions, openings and upgrades showcase the significant milestone.

Among them, Pennsylvania Convention Center installed more than 150 state-of-the-art digital screens, National Constitution Center opened two brand-new galleries, Museum of the American Revolution produced The Declaration’s Journey exhibit, and TED Democracy Philadelphia: Founding Futures honors the spirit of dialogue our founding fathers practiced. Wawa Welcome America will lure crowds for festivities, fireworks and fun June 19–July 4. Look for a multitude of events scheduled within the UNESCO World Heritage Site Historic District amid the African American Museum, Betsy Ross House, Independence Hall, Liberty Bell, Museum of the American Revolution and Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History. Many will take place in Franklin Square.

George Washington’s original 1777–1778 headquarters tent © Museum of the American Revolution

The city’s dynamic restaurant business entices every traveler. According to Josh Shapiro, governor of Pennsylvania, “Pioneers like Chef Marc Vetri worked hard to put the Philadelphia food scene on the map. It paid off … folks from around the world will come to learn — and taste — all that Philly has to offer.” Vetri, the James Beard Award-winning chef of Vetri Cucina — where I savored a four-course tasting menu — agrees: “The industry is important; along with art and culture, it’s among the main things that motivate people to visit. The internet is so vast that people 9,000 miles away are going to read about it and make the effort to visit a place they’ve learned about.”

Three Philly restaurants were awarded a coveted Michelin star in 2025: Friday Saturday Sunday is an elegant, seasonally inspired, fine-dining eatery; Her Place Supper Club (which I thoroughly enjoyed on a previous trip) evolved from Chef Amanda Shulman’s college-era dinner parties; and Chef Nicholas Bazik’s Provenance serves haute French cuisine with Korean influences.

Philadelphia’s top restaurateurs provide a wide variety of dining options. James Beard Award-winning restaurateur Stephen Starr (43 outlets) operates The Love, serving a lemony-buttery seafood pasta. Michael Schulson’s Schulson Collective (14 eateries) includes Prunella, an upscale pizza parlor, where the purple beet and radicchio salad is studded with bright orange segments.

Michael Solomonov creates Israeli cuisine (12 locations) at Zahav and K’Far. At McGillin’s Olde Ale House, the oldest continuously operating tavern in Philadelphia, sports fans flock for beer, stout and authentic Irish fare as well as bangers and mash.

The Burghers of Calais, in the courtyard of The Rodin Museum © Brian Logan | Dreamstime.com

Likewise, shepherd’s pie stands out on the menu at The Plough and The Stars. The recently renovated and conveniently located Bellevue Hotel — a grande dame dating from 1904 — offers a walking tour with David Kurlander, Historian in Residence, who points out the architectural details: mosaic tile floors, columns, high ceilings, original wrought iron and newly refurbished ballroom, event spaces and lodgings that open out to the multistoried Conservatory, and Pergola restaurant on the 19th floor.

Art museums along Benjamin Franklin Parkway rank among the world’s best. A ticket to the expansive Philadelphia Museum of Art includes two days’ entry to both it and The Rodin Museum of Art, where Jules E. Mastbaum donated the Beaux-Arts style venue and his collection of bronze and marble masterworks: The Thinker, The Gates of Hell, The Kiss, The Burghers of Calais and Rodin’s Hands.

The newly opened Calder Museum displays mobiles, stabiles and other artwork by Alexander Calder; his father, who created Swann Memorial Fountain in Logan Square; and his grandfather, who designed the William Penn sculpture atop City Hall. (That 500-foot, 40-story height was the legal limit for many decades!) The Barnes Foundation displays Alfred Barnes’ impressive collection — 186 by Renoir, 69 by Cezanne, 59 by Matisse and 46 by Picasso — each exactly as he meticulously placed them in 1922 within his original house museum in Merion, Pennsylvania.

At Richel d’Ambra Spa within the majestic The Ritz-Carlton Philadelphia, I relaxed while Regina, an expert aesthetician, integrated a medical-grade Hydrafacial wand that vacuums, exfoliates and hydrates with LED light therapy featuring Comfort Zone masks and creams.

Whether a visitor is a foodie, Philly or FIFA fan (Philadelphia will host six World Cup matches in 2026), this momentous anniversary is the time to recollect that William Penn founded the city as a place of religious tolerance and combined two Greek words — phileo (love) and adelphos (brother) — to name it Philadelphia.

SCENIC DRIVES
From Philadelphia’s Center City, it’s about a 60-mile (75- to 90-minute) drive to Atlantic City, New Jersey, the fastest-to-reach oceanfront resort. If beaches, boardwalks and casinos are not on your must-do list, consider two fabulously lovely venues created by Du Pont family members and each located about 30 miles from the city: Reach Winterthur Museum, Garden and Library in Brandywine Valley, Delaware, along winding rural roads.

Winterthur, the world’s premier museum of American furniture and decorative arts with 90,000 treasures, is Henry Francis du Pont’s legacy. The horticulturalist carefully designed a 25-mile path that meanders through rolling hills, meadows, woodlands and a 60-acre naturalistic garden on the 1,000-acre estate.

Longwood Gardens, in Kennett Square, Pennsylvania, was owned by Pierre S. du Pont, who laid out his first garden there in 1907. Considered one of the world’s great gardens, it features 1,000 acres of indoor and outdoor botanical displays. Today the complex contains a multitude of gardens, parks, woodlands, lakes, verdant lawns, a fern-laden glen, fountains and a pool … even a Garden Railway. Orchids, bonsai, acacias and azaleas thrive under glass roofs.

The Main Conservatory restaurant, 1906, overlooks the Main Fountain and serves some of the 200 varieties of produce grown in the estate’s Ornamental Kitchen Garden.