Wilton has, by some estimates, more than 500 restored 18th and 19th century homes.
"Teardowns have become quite an issue in town," Marilyn Gould, Wilton's second selectman and director of the Wilton Historical Society, told a reporter for the New York Times in 2005. "People aren't taking down historic houses but the more modest homes that were built in the 50's and 60's," she said. "What that's doing is changing the affordability of the town and the demographic of the town. Wilton used to have a wide demographic of people who worked with their hands - artisans, builders, mechanics. Now it's management and upper management." From 1999 to 2005, the town's voters have endorsed spending $23 million through municipal bonds to preserve land.
South Norwalk Electric and Water (SNEW) has a reserwoir on the western side of town with about 350 acres of land (along with another 25 adjacent acres in New Canaan). In the fall, hunters with bows and arrows are allowed to hunt deer on the property in Wilton in order to keep down the number of deer in the area. At any time during the deer-hunting season, no more than 10 hunters are allowed on the land.
Its town center contains the Village Market, an art gallery, and a four screen movie theater owned by Bowtie Cinemas. However, some of these stores were added around the year 2000. These new stores were built adjacent to the old Wilton Center. The old Wilton Center consists of the Wilton Library, the Wilton Post Office, a CVS, a hardware store, the Old Post Office Square, and the Village Market. In the Southern part of town, on Route 7, is a commercial section containing a Borders and an Outback Steakhouse. Until the early 1990's, Wilton was a "dry" town (it was illegal to sell alcohol in any form), but now alcohol can be sold in limited establishments and liquor licenses are strictly controlled (selling packaged alcohol is still prohibited).
Modern facilities include three elementary schools(Miller-Driscoll School, Cider Mill School), one middle school (Middlebrook Middle School), and one high school (Wilton High School), which features accelerated classes for gifted students, music and visual arts courses, and a well-appointed resource center. An innovative language laboratory encourages foreign language studies, including French, German, Spanish, Russian and Latin.
The Town of Wilton has 4,151 students who attend pre-K through 12th grade in the 5 schools. Two of the elementary schools (Miller and Driscoll Schools) are located on the same campus and they teach children from preschool through 2nd grade. The third elementary School (Cider Mill School) teaches 3rd through 5th grade. The three elementary schools have class sizes ranging from 18 to 22 and a 19 to 1 student/ teacher ratio. Language studies begin in the 3rd grade with French and Spanish. The junior high (Middlebrook) school is for grades 6-8 and features interdisciplinary instruction teams in languages and science, mathematics, social studies, computers, art, and gifted student instruction. Class sizes range from 20 to 25 students with a student/teacher ratio of 13 to 1. In the past five years, over 91% of Wilton High School graduates have gone on to colleges and universities. The mean SAT scores at Wilton High School are 584 verbal and 598 math. The schools are supported by an active PTA.
Wilton's sports teams have won many FCIAC and state titles, and many individuals have been recognized on those levels as well. For example, Wilton has won more state championships in lacrosse than any other town in Connecticut. Wilton, New Canaan and Darien comprise "The Big Three" in Connecticut lacrosse.
There are three private elementary schools in town:
- The Connecticut Friends School, a Quaker school, Kindergarten through eighth grade.
- Our Lady of Fatima, a Catholic school, preschool through eighth grade.
- Montessori School, preschool through eighth grade
