If an anti-mall movement exits, it should hire Dave Liscio as its mouthpiece.

“Malls are deadening,” gripes the 52-year-old photojournalist from Nahant, standing outside a Newburyport boutique after a father/daughter day spent kayaking in late fall. “It’s like being in an airplane. The air is re-circulated. People are wandering around at a death-crawl pace. Then there’s the formula — the same stores repeating themselves.”

We hear his pain. And we think we can help him put the esthetics — and adventure — back in shopping.

We’ve found three charming destinations for shopping — places steeped in history, graced with beautiful architecture and dotted with independently owned shops that you’d never find at a mall.

So in the spirit of giving, we offer these far-flung destinations and five reasons to venture there.

Chickens cluck and scatter as a car pulls up the driveway. Two children emerge from a centuries-old house into summer’s heat. With a foot in two seemingly different worlds, the girls announce they are bound for Water Country, New Hampshire’s Disney-esque water park, but are sidetracked, briefly, by an injured pet rabbit. Their mother announces she’ll tend to the goats before chauffeuring her daughters. Then, the threesome waves good-bye to the music man, who dashes for the barn as if it were a lodestone.

“To me, it is just paradise,” says Waltham’s Tod Machover, describing his barn. “This is where I write and record my music. You can feel the history … smell and see tradition in the walls and floor. I love the simplicity of it. When I’m thinking about my music, I can’t think of anywhere more perfect to think about ideas and get them down.”

A list of some of the most unique and trendy gadgets and stylish decorations for the fall season.

About 15 years ago, I had the good fortune of spending a week working in a restaurant in Auch, a town in the old provincial region of southwestern France known as Gascony, where duck is a mainstay of the local food culture. This dish is inspired by that experience.

If you decided that this is the summer that you want to get serious about outdoor floral arranging, then you picked a good year. The experts agree that the past two growing seasons in Massachusetts were tough — or, as Shawn Giurleo, of Millbrook Farms in Concord puts it, “horrible.” But this year is different — a nice balance of rain and sun has set us up for a bloomin’ great summer for flowers.

Over the years I have been the grateful recipient of many family treasures and antiques. Most of them easily find an honored spot in our home; the beautiful antique silver tea service is on the sideboard in the dining room, a wonderful oriental rug decorates the hall, and a child’s bentwood rocker from Germany adds a focal point to our study.

Designer Meryl Santopietro recommends you ask yourself these questions before you call in a kitchen designer:

We all want beautiful landscapes, but we want to enjoy them - not toil endlessly with the garden hose and trowel.   That's why containers are cool, small spaces are big, and green living is as good for you as it is for the environment. Here are the trends local landscape experts are excited about for summer 2007:

Some tips on where to find that flash of inspiration to transform your winter-weary home.

Maybe it's too early to dig in the garden, but it's the perfect time plan your plantings. Here are some new books to inspire you

Products and innovations we’ve just gotta have this spring…

    A dream kitchen requires the best in accessories, appliances and cooks' gadgets. Consider some of our favorites:

Plant sales, tours and gardening events you won't want to miss