This week Edgartown was bustling — mainly with landscaping crews who were renovating, refurbishing and touching up properties in time for the official start date of the tourist season. Lumber hung from the back of trucks and the smell of paint and fresh mown grass breezed along Main street and its peripheries, where many businesses are preparing to reopen to the public, and several more to just a few high-paying members.

With a fresh raft of high-end developments nearing completion, there is reason to consider that the face of Edgartown has, in recent years, changed significantly — and its character with it.

“There’s building materials and trucks thundering around everywhere, it’s like a perpetual big dig,” said Leslie Baynes, an Edgartown resident since 1979, this week. At the end of North Water street overlooking the Edgartown Light and outer harbor, the Harbor View Hotel and Resort reopened this week. The hotel, which has changed hands several times in recent years is under the new management of Thad Hyland. Mr. Hyland rejoined the hotel after a stint as manager in the early 1990s. A veteran hotelier, he has returned after successfully steering a California hotel to a five-diamond rating. Mr. Hyland was manager during the Harbor View’s last major refurbishment.

“We wanted to bring it back up to the grandeur as the grand dame of Edgartown,” he told the Gazette this week.

The hotel held a soft opening this week after closing for extensive refurbishments last fall. The redecorated restaurant and brand new bar are named Water Street and Henry’s respectively.

“It brings the view right into the restaurant now,” said Mr. Hyland. “It’s gorgeous.”

The kitchen has also been refurbished as have several of the cottages in the Harbor View compound. According to Mr. Hyland, the changes are based on a survey conducted with longtime visitors to the hotel.

“We’re putting in bigger bathrooms because that’s what people are looking for,” he said. “We’re keeping up with the times. The marketplace dictates what you do.”

He emphasized that all areas of the hotel are open to the public.

“It’s a big part of the town and, equally, the town is integral to its success,” said Mr. Hyland who was positive about the drive toward upscale development in Edgartown.

“People are repositioning their properties and it’s a great thing for the town,” he said.

The hotel, which was founded in 1891, will be open year-round again though further development and renovation plans are in the permitting stages and currently under review by the Martha’s Vineyard Commission. Total costs for all phases of development are estimated at $55 million, which would make it one of the most expensive projects in Island history.

Previous owner Robert Carroll lives in a penthouse apartment at the hotel where can he can look out at the boats coming back into harbor for the summer.

“I love this time of year,” Mr. Carroll said. “We’re very fortunate, but we don’t realize it.”

Repairs to North Water street, ongoing for more than two years, are finally coming to a close. Near the junction of Main street, the Edgartown Library is preparing to reopen after winter-long repairs to the building following a puff-back incident, where a burst furnace damaged books, furniture and artwork.

At the base of Main street by the docks the restaurant formerly known as the Navigator is set to reopen in July, extensively renovated and under the new name Atlantic. A new path at the front of the building connects Main street to dock space at the back. Two retail spaces on the ground floor will open for business next year, selling Atlantic merchandise.

Upstairs, the Boathouse, a private club, will also have a partial opening this season. In nearby Katama, The Field Club, a sister club to the boathouse, will open for a few functions.

A grand opening for all three is planned for next year.

“We’re super excited about the soft opening idea,” said co-owner Gerry Conover this week, “We want people to start enjoying the property.”

“There will be tennis, paddle tennis, bocce, and lawn games,” said Mr. Conover’s partner Thomas LeClair, speaking of the Field Club activities this summer.

With membership fees of up to $100,000 (150 members have signed on to date), the club’s amenities will be reserved for a select few. Mr. LeClair said the Field Club, built on land bought for $12.35 million, was devised as a creative way to pay for the renovation of the old Navigator.

Mr. LeClair said the project has long been envisioned as an amenity for the entire town.

“It’s terrific to have the ability to contribute to the town access to the waterfront,” he said, adding: “Everything else is kind of a bonus.”

And if Edgartown is different than when selectmen Arthur Smadbeck arrived in 1990, he has been too busy to notice.

“Did things change? Probably,” he said this week, “but when you’ve got five children you’re not looking to see if something’s changed. You’re just trying to survive.”

Mr. Carroll, who was born on Summer street, points to a demographic shift from the town center.

“We used to have all the poor people in the center of town because nobody could afford a car,” he said.

Perhaps as a result, stores relied on by the year-round community have moved out of the town center, along with the post office. Sharky’s Cantina, a bar and family-themed restaurant recently opened on Upper Main street, though its Oak Bluffs equivalent is in the heart of town on Circuit avenue. Though a few staples have survived such as Edgartown Hardware, Sun Dog clothing store, Claudia jewelry and the Dock street diner, Main Street is now dominated by seasonal businesses.

Mr. Carroll cautioned that as someone who has lived in the town since 1924, he is bound to detect change.

“If you got off-Island in high school back then, you were quite a big deal,” he said. However, much of what he points to has occurred in the short-term.

“Houses quadruple in size every year,” he said. “Did I like the Island better years ago? Yes, in may ways I did.”