GREAT BARRINGTON, Mass. – The Thornewood Inn will soon turn into a new workforce housing facility.

What You Need To Know

  • Thornewood Inn was bought by CBCSB

  • It will be turned into workforce housing

  • CDCSB is a nonprofit that helps with affordable housing

  • It will help people with affordable housing close to their work in Great Barrington

It comes after the Community Development Corporation of South Berkshire purchased the Great Barrington property. 

The CDCSB is a nonprofit aiming to create affordable housing, and says it saw the need for workers to have an affordable place closer to their job. 

“The difficulty in finding staff who can not only live close by and get to work but also afford to live in Berkshire County is challenging for them,” said one of the board of directors at CBCSB, McCaela Donovan.

Dennis Iodice is the business manager at Berkshire Mountain Bakery, and has seen firsthand the need for staff, especially during the summer when it's most busy.

“We are constantly having problems finding staff, staff who need housing. Pre-COVID, we had a lot of people who would come to the Berkshires just to apprentice with us for a year or two, and there’s no housing,” Iodice said.

The community development corporation says Thornewood Inn presents a perfect opportunity for people who work in downtown Great Barrington.

“They might say, 'I just want to be closer to my job, I want to be on the bus line, it’s too far for me to come from wherever, Pittsfield, Dalton, wherever they are coming from.' So it makes their life a little easier, and it gets them right into downtown where their work is,” Donovan said.

The Thornewood will consist of 18 rooms when renovation work is finished. The rooms will come furnished and range in prices from $1,000 to about $1,800, depending on the room.  

There will be a community office with computers and a community lounge, as well as a shared kitchen for residents.

“You can have the privacy you need but you also can have the community aspect of it that’s really nice cause that sort of feels like it's missing sometimes. And I think for single people or for couples, or for people that feel like their new here, it’s a nice way to engage,” said Donovan.

Parts of the inn are still under construction, but applications are now open for people to join from their waitlist with priority being people who work in Great Barrington. The Thornewood could start renting by next week as work continues to progress. 

Rent is month to month and utilities are included.