Welcome to the Historic Bluffton Foundation.
Our Purpose
“Bring people together to share our history and culture.”
Today Historic Bluffton Foundation (HBF) is headquartered at the Heyward House Museum & Welcome Center located at 70 Boundary Street in Historic Bluffton. The Foundation also owns the Colcock-Teel House (46 Colcock Street), and the Caldwell Archives, which is maintained and operated inside Bluffton Town Hall (20 Bridge Street).
HBF is working hard on preserving the two historic homes it owns, and helping with preservation throughout the town. We are a part of several non-profit organizations that promote history and culture, and continue to keep the education of Bluffton’s history and culture a real mission.
Cole-Heyward house
The Cole-Heyward House, built as a summer home for a local plantation owner, was constructed circa 1841 and is one of only eight antebellum homes remaining in the Lowcountry coastal town of Bluffton. Located in the heart of Bluffton’s National Register Historic District, next to the breezy bluffs overlooking the May River, this simple timber framed home is an excellent example of the Carolina Farmhouse Style that was brought from the West Indies and made popular from the Colonial period up to the Civil War.
The house was designed by John J. Cole and was constructed utilizing the labor of his enslaved. Built for his young bride, Esther Caroline Corley, the house was a beloved retreat for the family allowing them to escape the heat, insects, and disease of the plantation and to socialize with other planter families during the balmy summer months.
The Cole-Heyward House site, with its original slave cabin and reproduced summer kitchen, is also named for the Heyward family who owned the home from the early 1880s until 1998. The family of George Cuthbert Heyward, grandson of one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Heyward Jr., was the first Heyward family to reside in the home. The Heyward house has been virtually untouched by time; not much has changed, materially speaking, over the past 179 years.
Because of its well-preserved condition, the Heyward House is now an Official Project of the Save America’s Treasures Program, a public-private partnership between the White House Millennium Council and the National Trust for Historic Preservation. Operated by the Historic Bluffton Foundation, the house-museum also currently acts as the official Welcome Center for the Town of Bluffton.
More about the Heyward House museum & welcome center.
Get acquainted with our town from the inside out by stopping at the Heyward House Museum and Welcome Center. We have maps, brochures, menus and information to help you plan your visit while visiting Bluffton. Make a day of it and spend the afternoon strolling our moss-draped streets and immerse yourself in the natural beauty that makes this such a special place.
Our staff is ready to answer your questions and give you directions to your next stop along the way. When you visit we hope that you'll come by and say hello and give us a chance to make a great first impression.
Plan Your Visit
— Address
Historic Bluffton Foundation
at the Heyward House
70 Boundary Street
Bluffton, SC 29910
(843) 757-6293
Mailing Address
PO Box 742
Bluffton, SC 29910
— Parking
The town's new parking at Wright Family Park, adjacent to the Heyward House on Green Street, now provides 70 new spaces and easy access to our facilities. Excess Museum Parking is also located beside the Heyward House on the shoulder of Bridge Street.
*The back of the house is utilized as tour space, and is reserved for staff and accessible handicap parking only.
— Hours
Monday - Friday: 10am-5pm
Saturday: 11am-4pm
Scheduled Closures - Subject to change:
Memorial Day | Juneteenth Day | Independence Day | Labor Day | Thanksgiving Day | Christmas Eve | Christmas Day | New Year’s Day
*Tours are not offered during the last hour of operation.
To learn more about the
Historic Bluffton Foundation
please contact:
843-757-6293 | info@heywardhouse.org