In 1946, BCD was founded with twelve students by a group of local parents who saw the need for an independent, co-educational school where children would receive the maximum individual attention in small classes. The first few students were taught in a small building on the campus of the Lenox School for Boys, an Episcopal boys' boarding school, and initially served students in pre-school and grades one through six. Tuition ranged from $150 to $310, depending on the grade. In 1957, the school moved to the former Starks home on Walker Street in Lenox, which became the main building of the school. Then serving preschool through eighth grade, BCD used a nearby building called Bassett Hall, which is now the Kemble Inn, for the seventh and eighth grade. Enrollment tripled between 1958 and 1963, from 58 students to 183. BCD was considered revolutionary at the time, teaching reading to kindergarten students; traditionally, public schools in the '50s and '60s did not begin to teach reading until third grade. In 1961, BCD launched a ski program, serving as the winter physical education effort, which continues to this day on "Ski Fridays."

In 1963, under the guidance of principal Donald T. Oakes, BCD purchased the current Brook Farm property from the Stokes family, which offered much needed room for expansion. For one year, the school operated at both the Brook Farm and Walker Street locations. The younger students attended school at Brook Farm, while the older ones remained at Walker Street, busing to the new campus for arts and sports. The Walker Street building was later destroyed by fire. In the 1967-68 academic year, a ninth grade was added to the school.

In the early '70s, the Lenox School closed, along with several other boarding schools in Berkshire County, and was sold to the Bordentown Military Institute. It was later bought by Bible Speaks, then sold to the National Music Foundation, and was recently purchased by Shakespeare & Company.

The Brook Farm campus dates back to the 1890s and is included in the National Register of Historic Places. Originally, it was a working farm — with a farmhouse, barns, and stables — on the 1,000-acre Shadowbrook estate, which was built as a summer "cottage" in 1892-1896 by Anson Phelps Stokes, a prominent New York businessman. Atop the hill overlooking Brook Farm and the Stockbridge Bowl, the Shadowbrook mansion had 100 rooms and stretched to 410 feet, complete with grounds designed by architect Frederick Law Olmsted. The Stokes family sold the Shadowbrook estate after only ten years, following a horseback riding incident that resulted in Mr. Stokes' loss of a leg and, subsequently, his interest in the property. The Shadowbrook estate was sold in 1906 to Spencer Shotter from Savannah, Georgia. The house was leased in 1916 and 1917 to Mrs. Alfred Gwynne Vanderbilt and then sold to Andrew Carnegie, who lived there until his death in 1919.

In 1922, the New England Province of the Society of Jesus purchased the Shadowbrook estate, which the Jesuits used as a seminary. The entire structure burned to the ground in a tragic fire in 1956, in which four of the Jesuits died. The Society then built the current brick structure on the site, maintaining their operation of the property until 1970, when they could no longer support it. The building stood empty for many years until the Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health purchased it in 1983.

Meanwhile, Brook Farm was passed on to the Stokes' son Anson Phelps Stokes, Jr., an Episcopal priest, secretary of Yale University, and Canon of the National Cathedral. Canon Stokes moved his family to Brook Farm, where they lived in the renovated farmhouse. The farm, which had supplied produce for Shadowbrook, included the family residence, now Albright Hall of BCD; the cow barn (Furey Hall); the machinery and equipment barn (Ryan Hall); and the stable (Oakes Hall). The Ice House was converted into a library for Canon Stokes (now Sprague Environmental Science Lab). The donkey shed and the calf barn are now the middle school science labs (Peseckis Hall), and the farmland has been converted into athletic fields and playgrounds. A pond was dug for swimming and skating, and the property features a nature trail created in memory of a former student. In 1969, W. Rankin Furey, a BCD benefactor, helped establish a library in Albright Hall, named the Martha Jane Furey Kittredge Library, in memory of his daughter. In 1972, a head of school's house was built at the rear of the property. In the mid-'70s, the second floor of Furey Hall was transformed into art studios, and in the early '80s, the former library was converted into the Environmental Studies Lab. In 1996, Fitzpatrick Hall was built, and in 1999, Peterson Hall was completed, along with a new maintenance and shop building (Clemons Hall).