Stars Hollow, Connecticut
It’s in this postcard-pretty town (a half-hour’s drive from Hartford) that single-mom Lorelai Gilmore raises her teenage daughter Rory.
POINTS OF INTEREST: The Gilmore home, Luke’s Diner, the Independence Inn (and, later, the Dragonfly Inn), and Kim’s Antiques (surely the only Korean-owned antique store in all of New England).
LIVABILITY: A low crime rate, a decent proximity to Boston and New York City, and the arboreal charms of the Nutmeg State? What’s not to like? (The town might be too twee for some: it does, after all, have its own official troubadour.)
REAL-LIFE INSPIRATION: The village of Washington Depot, CT. Gilmore creator Amy Sherman-Paladino once passed through and was very much moved by a “feeling of warmth and small-town camaraderie.”
SHOOTING LOCATION(S): Much of the series’ pilot was shot in a leafy Canadian village—those exteriors were recreated on a Warner Bros. studio back lot, and included a few sets previously used in some well-known movies (The Music Man) and TV shows (The Dukes of Hazzard and The Waltons).
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V8K5gZSp8OA]