Old clothing and chairs are more than just artifacts at Ash Lawn-Highland. These pieces — items owned or on loan to the presidential home — make up two exhibits that will on display this year.

Visitors to Ash Lawn-Highland will soon be able to buy two new books about the life and times of James Monroe.

Held since 1978 at Ash Lawn-Highland, James Monroe’s 535-acre farm in Albemarle County, the Ash Lawn Opera Festival is expected to relocate to an as-yet-to-be-determined indoor venue by next summer’s opera season.

At James Monroe’s 535-acre farm Ash Lawn-Highland there are no sprawling multi-million-dollar construction projects. There is no plan to revamp Monroe’s early-1800 era house. And there is no obvious desire to divert from the site’s sleepily charming course of the past three decades.