Our Rich Cultural Heritage

The cultural advantages of living in North Carolina’s Wake County are as rich and robust as just about anyone could desire. From performing arts to museums to arts festivals to educational or business opportunities for artists and designers, the Triangle’s offerings are among the nation’s best.

Every year, the Raleigh Arts Festival is celebrated in downtown Raleigh, drawing thousands of participants -- visual artists, performers, volunteers, sponsors, and patrons. North Carolina boasts the first local arts council in the nation and the first state-supported symphony and museum of art. If you want to see the nation’s largest art museum park, come to the North Carolina Museum of Art which features paintings and sculpture representing more than 5,000 years of artistic heritage from ancient Egypt to the present.

North Carolina Theatre strengthens the cultural vitality of our region, producing outstanding professional Broadway musicals and developing the next generation of artists through youth training, performance and outreach programs.

Because of escalating production prices and the movement of manufacturing offshore, the textile and apparel industries -- once a staple of the North Carolina economy -- have suffered during the past decade. The upside is that today there is a region-wide industry trend toward producing more technically advanced products through fields such as nanotechnology or other knowledge-based approaches.

For instance, Tumbling Colors is a Raleigh-based business whose research and development supports big name designers with worldwide reputations. The N.C. Dept of Commerce says that graduates of the company’s student internship program, in partnership with N.C. State, have gone on to careers in the fashion industry in New York, London and Hong Kong.

ArtBistro.com named Raleigh-Cary the #5 Top City for Designers and Artists in May 2009. And in its April 2009 issue, American Style Magazine recognized Raleigh as a Top Arts Destination among Mid-Size Cities.