In the 1888, artists attracted to Perkins Cove's picturesque qualities as a New England fishing inlet, established a colony through the efforts of Massachusetts-born marine artist Charles Woodbury.

Woodbury opened an academy for his students in 1898, the "Ogunquit Summer School of Drawing and Painting," eventually converting some of the surrounding fishing shacks into living space where artists obtained room and board. Many of his students included women from the Boston area who wished to master Woodbury's impressionistic style.

By the end of the nineteenth century, Perkins Cove held a firm reputation as an artistic haven.