The American poet James Merrill and his partner David Jackson moved to the borough of Stonington, Connecticut, in 1954, purchasing a property at 107 Water Street.

[3] It had once been a nineteenth-century residential and commercial structure that had first served as a drug store and a residence for the owner's family.

Village life and the apartment itself inspired some of his most important work, including The Changing Light at Sandover, his book-length epic poem based on Merrill's and Jackson's communications with the spirit world by means of a Ouija board in the turret dining room on the third floor.

In the years since Merrill's death, over a hundred writers have used this space as a residence and retreat.

Each writer typically gives a public live or live-streamed presentation of new work while in residence.