These Two Ski Clubs Are Bringing Aspen-Style Luxury to Northeast Slopes

Noah Lederman
·4 min read
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Out west, in towns like Aspen, Vail, and Park City, the powder is just better. But it’s completely obvious to anyone who’s drawn a breath in the last 25 years that their villages aren’t ultimately ski destinations—they’re stages. Boldface names come here to flaunt fur. Masters of the universe gather to play Monopoly. Business rivals joust for the better table at the best restaurants.

The mountain resorts of the northeast have never had big enough pools for these big fish. Slopes from Pennsylvania to Maine are often patched with ice (or even grass). The “villages” off the chairlift lack pizzazz—some even like it that way. 

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Now, two mountains are attempting to change that with membership models.

Windham Mountain in the Catskills
New York’s Windham Mountain is hoping to tempt Manhattanites to a ski scene closer to home.

Just before the start of this ski season, New York’s Windham Mountain in the northern section of the Catskill Mountains changed its name. It now operates as the Windham Mountain Club with the intent to lure Tri-Staters willing to pay an approximately $250,000 membership fee, as well as annual dues. The mountain has always had a members program, albeit at a lower price point and with fewer offerings, including a members-only dining room, a ski valet, and valet parking. While those extras will continue, membership for the 2024-25 season promises things like exclusive mountain access for members and their guests to ride first-tracks, along with members-only experiences at the forthcoming spa and fitness center, adventure center, and Tom Fazio-designed golf course. The aquatic and racket center hopes to pop up in 2026.

This year, most of the club’s dreams are swirling in the pipe, and the improvements have been modest: The locale upgraded one lift, added automated snowmaking on a few trails, and beautified its patio. The attempt to up its dining game is still in test-mode. The food at its Mediterranean Seasons restaurant is nothing to write to the Middle East about. But Cin Cin, the mid-mountain former ski lodge, which has been redesigned into a fine-dining Italian restaurant, opened in December and provides that elevated experience members would hope to receive moving forward. The Negroni menu draws guests up the ski lift to dine beneath the deer-head trophies hung on the wood walls.

The Windham Mountain Club is just the latest mountain to try and bring the Aspen model to New England—the Lodge at Spruce Peak, the ski-in, ski-out resort in Stowe, Vermont, has been trying it for years. But there are signs of new momentum of late.

The lobby of Spruce Peak
Blink in the lobby at Spruce Peak and you might just be transported.

Entering Spruce Peak offers that Rockies vibe: roaring fireplaces, a sushi and oyster bar (notably closer to an ocean than any Aspen establishment serving raw fish), and a happening lobby bar.

In the surrounding village, you’re apt to see real live people showing off the goods. They gather by pergolas and fire pits that circle the central skating rink and at the nearby Whistle Pig Pavilion. Now, there’s a speakeasy in an old mechanical room, where a wooden record player produces beautiful crackles on the bar.

Tucked away between the skating rink and ski slopes is the members-only area replete with exclusive dining experiences, wine lockers, and other offerings. For half the price of Windham’s initial fee, (but a slightly higher annual rate at $15,000), membership at Spruce Peak provides perks such as members-only events, third-of-a-mile-high golf, and access to the fitness center, pool, and slope-facing spa.

In pursuit of attracting more with new, the resort is currently completing construction on the final phase of the Treehouse, the fourth luxury residence building. Pound for pound they aren’t even close to competing with the mega-homes of Aspen, but these one-to-four bedroom spreads are majorly upping the ante for the area. Entryways, for instance, are done up with lichen-scarred white birch bark and blackened wood, created using the Japanese technique of shou sugi ban.

While the icier skiing at Windham or Stowe will never compare to the fluff out where Horace Greeley said to go, the ingredients for an improved social scene have arrived. After all, why should Manhattanites have to fly all the way to Colorado just to schmooze?

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