Westhaven

Franklin, TN

August 2025

Westhaven is Southern Land Company's flagship master-planned community in Franklin, Tennessee—a charming, historic town. Decades in the making, this 1,500-acre community embodies SLC Founder & CEO Tim Downey's transformative vision for traditional neighborhood development. Westhaven thoughtfully weaves the conveniences of urban living into a historically suburban setting, combining extensive green spaces and walkability, communal wellness and social spaces, unique programming, a Village Center, and an elementary school. Since the first residents moved in over 20 years ago, Westhaven has evolved into a multi-generational community with mature tree-lined streets and unique architectural designs that reflect homeowners’ personal styles.

Southern Land Company broke ground on Westhaven in 2002. The original part of the 1,500-acre master plan intentionally weaves together diverse housing options. This thoughtful integration resulted in residential streets with a mix of styles, sizes, and architectural designs, fostering an inclusive environment where all residents can connect as neighbors regardless of their home type.

Upon completion, Westhaven will have 3,400 homes, including single-family homes, paired villas, townhomes, and condos. As the community continued to grow, the SLC team observed that relatives of Westhaven residents were also relocating to the community to be closer to their siblings, children, grandchildren, and even friends. This inspired the planning team at SLC to integrate various housing types to accommodate the diverse needs and preferences of homeowners across different life stages. Westhaven even has a dedicated age-qualified section, which will be complemented by an upcoming rental community.

When SLC first started planning for Westhaven more than two decades ago, SLC worked with renowned planning, urban design, and architecture firm DPZ CoDesign. With this collaboration, SLC was able to create a community that seamlessly blends with the surrounding locale while offering a distinctive neighborhood experience for those looking to call Franklin, Tennessee home. Since breaking ground on Westhaven, SLC has grown and evolved into a vertically integrated developer, consisting of development, infrastructure, design, construction and homebuilding, horticulture, and community management teams. This allows SLC to ensure the quality of Westhaven's design and offerings and maintain the resident experience.

Balancing out the suburban setting, Westhaven’s Village Center offers shops and boutiques, 10 different restaurant, bars, and eateries, and a major grocery retailer within walking distance. More than just a place to pop in for basic needs, the Village Center also serves as a gathering place to meet with friends and family. Located at the entrance to Westhaven, the Village Center welcomes residents, Franklin locals, and visitors alike.

As a true traditional neighborhood development, Westhaven offers walkable conveniences, whether it’s the Pearre Creek Elementary School, Residents Club, or Fit 2 at the Village Center.

Westhaven’s Fit 2 fitness center offers a full complement of strength training weights, cardio equipment, and trainers who are available to design a personalized exercise regimen. This is one of two fitness centers in the community.

A dedicated 15,000-square-foot Residents' Club serves as a central gathering place at the heart of Westhaven, where residents can utilize one of the community's two state-of-the-art fitness centers, a movement studio, an art center, a 37-seat theater, and drop-in daycare. These thoughtfully designed spaces allow homeowners ample opportunity to connect with neighbors while participating in wellness classes and programs or join the neighborhood's many social groups and clubs.

The Residents' Club also features opportunities for outdoor activity at the resort-inspired pool and on the great lawn, where residents can enjoy special programming like concerts and classes.

In addition to the community's pool at the Residents' Club, Westhaven's Skube Swim Center offers another warm-weather recreation and fitness option, outfitted with a competition swimming pool, fire pits, covered seating area, and café and grill.

Located adjacent to Westhaven, just past the Skube Swim Center, Westhaven Golf Club is a private 18-hole championship golf club. A spacious clubhouse includes an award-winning restaurant on the main level and a more relaxed dining experience with the Turn Grille on the lower level. Westhaven Golf Club also houses The Golf Performance Center at Westhaven, which offers fittings and instruction and is open to the public.

Westhaven's dedicated lifestyle manager, along with a team of expert community management professionals, ideates, organizes, and executes regular and special events and programming, including back-to-school pool parties, an annual Fourth of July Fireworks show, charitable drives, an annual neighborhood holiday tree lighting, and more.

As Westhaven is comprised of residents with varied interests, hobbies, and professions, a number of social groups and programming are organized by them. One notable example is the Westhaven Foundation, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit entity formed by a small group of Westhaven residents, which organizes and hosts a number of events and partners with local organizations to serve the greater Middle Tennessee community. Over the past several years the group has organized annual events like the Westhaven 5K Memory Run, which raises funds to benefit the Alzheimer’s Association’s Tennessee Chapter, and Porchfest (seen here), a free music festival featuring local musicians performing on the front porches of homes throughout Westhaven and…

…concluding with a ticketed headliner concert. While the amenities are thoughtfully planned to foster organic opportunities for social connection, the residents themselves and Westhaven’s lifestyle director have built up a neighborly sense of place that reverberates through the entire community.

To ensure Westhaven's overall design remains complementary to the surrounding Middle Tennessee landscape, SLC committed nearly half of the community to open green spaces, planned parks, and miles of trails. Not only does this add to the area's natural environment, but it also offers homeowners convenient access to outdoor activities, such as walking and hiking, and creates organic opportunities for neighborly interaction.

Following Westhaven's commitment to intentional design, parks and green spaces are strategically distributed throughout the community for optimal accessibility. Families can reach their nearest playground, pocket park, or green space within a comfortable five-minute walk.

Overtime, a master plan can truly come to life through mature tree-lined streets that create natural canopies and fully landscaped green spaces that celebrate the area’s natural beauty.

Walk down the streets in Westhaven and you will find home styles ranging from classical to craftsman to modern Tudor to modern farmhouse and beyond. The architectural vision for Westhaven was to craft distinctive homes with timeless exterior styles that honor the character of their Franklin setting while keeping in mind contemporary functionality and market trends. Earth tone colors are often used to keep the streetscape interesting, while mixing in tones of white, gray and taupe.

While no two homes are identical, each single-family home, townhome, and paired villa has one standout common denominator—a spacious front porch. The front porches in Westhaven are yet another demonstration of strategic design with greater purpose: primarily, to provide a venue for neighbor interaction, and secondarily, to act as a buffer between the public sidewalk and private home interior. Westhaven porches are raised approximately 18 inches above the sidewalk, giving the homeowner a position of semi-privacy with easy opportunity to invite someone onto their front porch, and a minimum of eight feet deep, providing ample space for gathering and relaxing.

SLC has partnered with a collection of top-tier builders—Ford Classic Homes, Legend Homes, Stonegate Homes, and Zurich Homes—to ensure Westhaven’s residential streets are lined with a diverse collection of homes.

As Westhaven evolved over time, attracting multiple generations of family to live within the same community, SLC decided to introduce an exclusive active adult neighborhood.

Designed for 55+ homeowners, the 146 for-sale homes will be complemented by the upcoming Astor Club & Residences, an active adult rental community that will provide resort-style amenities and services, including curated culinary experiences.

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Westhaven

Product type: Masterplan

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Developers

Southern Land Company

JBREC Consultant

Don Walker

Managing Principal

San Diego, CA

dwalker@jbrec.com

Location

187 Front St

Phone number (615) 599-1764

Region Southeast

State Tennessee

City Franklin

Zip Code 37064