Our Town
Nestled among the spring-fed Butler Chain of Lakes, the cozy Town of Windermere, population 2,300, has emerged as the region's new-money address of choice.
"This is where it's at," says longtime Windermere resident Suzi Karr, owner of Suzi Karr Realty. "We're the hot area."
With Lake Butler on the west, Lake Down on the east and Lake Bessie on the southeast, Windermere is a verdant peninsula on which some of Central Florida's priciest real estate sits.
But, although they advertise Windermere addresses, most of the ritzy developments aren't technically in Windermere. The town itself is just 689 acres, and consists largely of a laid-back retail district with some mom-and-pop stores and a scattering of older homes lining sandy streets. Those streets remain unpaved to discourage traffic and to prevent runoff from damaging the Butler Chain, which consists of eight pristine lakes connected via a canal system.
The lakes attracted one of Windermere's first investors, Joseph Hill Scott, an English clergyman who in 1885 bought 150 acres. Scott's son, Stanley, homesteaded the property and supposedly named it after Lake Windermere in England.
The railroad connected Windermere and Kissimmee in 1889, but freezes in 1894 and 1895 destroyed the town's citrus industry. Little changed until 1910, when a pair of Ohio investors named D.H. Johnson and J. Calvin Palmer bought all the land they could piece together and formed the Windermere Improvement Company for the purpose of developing it.
The pair promoted "Beautiful Lakes of Pure Spring Water," and aimed their marketing at moneyed northerners.
What worked nearly a century ago is working today. The lakes, along with world-class golf courses, stunning scenery and a bucolic ambience, still attract new residents to this west Orlando" target="_blank">Orange County enclave.
Although few who live here want to see the town change significantly, Windermere city officials are making concessions to the growth surrounding it.
The town recently approved a $3.4 million project to revamp the downtown area, bricking three blocks of Main and Frontage streets, expanding parking lots, replacing stop signs with roundabouts and generally upgrading its appearance.
And developer Kevin Azzouz, who last year purchased much of the property in the business district, has talked about creating a town center, much to the consternation of residents who like downtown's unpretentious combination of shabby and chic.
Consultants are also working with elected officials on an annexation policy, which would give the city control over development outside its current borders. In the past, residents have fought annexation because it would dramatically increase the city's population.
WINTER GARDEN
It was 1857 when Becky Roper Stafford's great-great-grandfather first glimpsed Lake Apopka. W.C. Roper was riding through the backwoods of west Orlando" target="_blank">Orange County on horseback, seeking a place to build a home for his family waiting back in Merriwether County, Ga.
Roper bought 600 acres along the shore, between present-day Winter Garden and Oakland, and returned a year later with his wife and 10 children. The ambitious settler operated a sawmill, gristmill, sugar mill and cotton gin. Later he built a tannery for making shoes, and served as Orlando" target="_blank">Orange County's superintendent of schools from 1873 to 1877.
Fast-forward to the 1920s, when Roper's son Frank planted the area's first orange trees, marking the humble beginnings of an industry that would sustain and define Winter Garden, which had been incorporated in 1903, for the next six decades.
It was a busy time for Winter Garden's three-story Edgewater Hotel-now a bed-and-breakfast-which opened in 1927 with a telegraph office, electric heating and fire sprinkler system. As the only hotel in the western portion of the county for nearly 30 years, the Edgewater emerged as a primary community gathering spot, a place where special events were held and business deals were sealed.
Winter Garden remained an idyllic small town throughout World War II and into the 1950s and 1960s. Far removed from Orlando, which was about to be reshaped by the advent of Disney World, the city remained self-sufficient and unpretentious.
"I grew up with the scent of orange blossoms," says Stafford, whose father Bert was also a prominent local citrus grower. She remembers when Davis' Pharmacy was the place to meet friends for a vanilla Coke and when the Starlite Drive-in attracted weekend crowds of teens and families alike.
"Winter Garden was the quintessential vibrant small town," says Stafford. "We had the distinction of being the only town with two train depots because it was such a busy shipping community with fresh fruit going all over the world."
Fast-forward again to the 1980s, when devastating freezes destroyed thousands of acres of citrus. Roper Growers Cooperative, Heller Brothers and Louis Dreyfus Citrus eventually recovered. But as growers regrouped or retreated, once bustling downtown Winter Garden became a virtual ghost town.
Concurrently, developers began buying up decimated groves for new homes, creating new subdivisions seemingly overnight. But most of the residential growth, and the retail growth that followed, was outside the city, which made Winter Garden proper even more of an anachronism.
Then came a brilliant project called Rails to Trails, through which abandoned railbeds across the country were converted into hiking and biking trails. The popular West Orange Trail passed directly through Winter Garden, thus converting the all-but-forgotten city into an oasis to thousands of ready-to-spend strollers.
"Rails to Trails has been an incredible catalyst," says Stafford, who now works with the Winter Garden Heritage Foundation to help rekindle her hometown memories. "All of a sudden, we had 10,000, then 20,000, now 50,000 people a month coming through downtown Winter Garden."
City officials have made certain that these visitors will be charmed by what they see. In 2001, the tired downtown district underwent a facelift during which brick streets were restored, old buildings were remodeled and Centennial Fountain, saluting the city's citrus-growing heritage, was constructed.
Today locals and outlanders gather at Choctaw Willie's in the reopened Edgewater Hotel for barbecue, collard greens and sweet tea. Across the street, Moon Cricket Café serves eclectic cuisine and an array of micro-brewed beers. Winter Garden Pizza Factory is all about pasta, fresh pies and family fun.
Proprietor-owned shops, like JR's Attic, Downtown Herb Shoppe and Every Little Girl's Dream are thriving. But you'll still find a wonderfully cluttered hardware store that sells farming supplies, which serves as a reminder that this town quaintness isn't contrived.
And, locals proudly note, Winter Garden features two historical museums open seven days a week. There's the Central Florida Railroad Museum and the Heritage Museum, both housed in restored depots. History buffs may also stroll around the city and view such landmarks as the 1860s-era Beulah Baptist Church.
"Winter Garden has reinvented itself," says MaryAnne Swickerath, editor of the West Orange Times, established in 1904. Swickerath has covered the city for a quarter-century, and says she delights in its new joie de vivre. "There's a new spirit," she notes. "There are a lot of new residents with a lot of new pride."
And redevelopment is on a roll: Stafford is hard at work with the Winter Garden Heritage Foundation to renovate the historic Garden Theater on Plant Street. The old movie house, which will become a 300-seat performing arts center, is set to reopen in 2005.
"The progress made in the last five years has taken Winter Garden back to being the booming community it once was," says Stafford.
But Winter Garden enters it second century facing unprecedented challenges.
Within the city limits, residential building permits jumped from 522 in 1999-2000 to 769 in 2002-2003, according to City Manager Hollis Holden. The population has doubled from the mid '90s, making Winter Garden one of the fastest-growing cities of its size in Florida.
Indeed, nowhere is west Orlando" target="_blank">Orange County's development boom more evident than along C.R. 535 and S.R. 545 south of Winter Garden. More than 40 communities totaling 25,000 homes are expected to be built where citrus groves once flourished.
The biggest of the new developments is Horizon West, a 38,000-acre master-planned community that has been in the planning stages for a decade. At buildout, its two villages-Bridgewater and Lakeside-will contain nearly 18,000 homes.
The first neighborhood is Independence, located in the Bridgewater village and developed by Transeastern Properties. The 1,342-acre project will encompass 2,415 homes, a 5,300-foot clubhouse, two town centers, three schools, two lakes and 600 acres of parks and preservation areas.
Prices in Americana-themed Independence will range from $170,000 townhomes and condomiums to $2.2 million single-family homes with lake frontage. The first 30 lakefront lots were released for sale in May while 600 more lots went on the market in July.
Although neighborhoods within Horizon West will have easy access to town centers, expect additional retail and commercial development to follow homebuyers west. Facilitating that growth is construction of the Western Beltway from Florida's Turnpike to the north and U.S. 192 to the south.
The burgeoning area may even get a community college. Valencia Community College is eyeing a 200-acre site on Schofield Road, near C.R. 545 and Horizon West.
WINTER PARK
Once a haven for artists, writers and some of the most influential families in the world, Winter Park was promoted in the late 1800s as a refuge for "the cultured and wealthy." Those early boosters would almost certainly be pleased to see how it all turned out.
Today, the city is home to 70 parks and nearly as many oak trees (20,000) as residents (24,090). Its eight square miles encompass lovely old homes, an upscale shopping district, a prestigious liberal arts college, a plethora of galleries and museums and street signs that admonish motorists to "drive with extraordinary care."
The heart of Winter Park is Park Avenue, stretching 10 blocks and boasting more than 100 shops, from upscale national retailers to one-of-a-kind boutiques. "The Avenue," as locals call it, is a European-inspired thoroughfare featuring hidden courtyards, sidewalk cafés and charming Central Park facing the storefronts.
On the south end of Park Avenue is the Charles Hosmer Morse Museum of American Art, showcasing the world's largest collection of Tiffany glass. Each Christmas, a set of priceless, holiday-themed Tiffany windows are moved to Central Park, where they are displayed as part of the city's seasonal festivities.
Just west of downtown is the up-and-coming West New England Avenue District, a historic neighborhood that's now home to chic shops and restaurants including Dexter's and Chez Vincent, both big draws for the wine-and-brie crowd.
Several blocks farther west is Winter Park Village, a red-hot retail and entertainment center on U.S. Hwy. 17-92. New condominiums are available in the Village, which attracts a generally younger crowd than Park Avenue and has emerged as one of Central Florida's most popular see-and-be-seen destinations.
Year-round the city is alive with festivals and special events, from the Sidewalk Art Festival, drawing more than 250,000 guests each spring, to the Exotic Car Show and Florida Film Festival.
On the shores of Lake Virginia, beautiful Rollins College, the oldest institution of higher education in Florida and one of the top-rated private liberal arts colleges in the country, is home to the Cornell Fine Arts Museum and the internationally renowned Bach Festival Choir.
Incongruous as it may sound, Winter Park also hosts a Farmers Market on Saturday mornings where visitors can buy everything from fresh produce to houseplants and crafts.
Although the city was essentially built out decades ago, several infill projects offer new homes in older neighborhoods. The largest new residential development is Windsong, carved from heavily forested, lakefront property once owned by the estate of philanthropists Hugh McKean and his wife Jeanette Genius McKean.
In fact, Windsong has been so successful that it might expand to an adjacent 15-acre site once occupied by Glenridge Middle School. This year the school moved into a new facility on the south side of Glenridge Way, and the old complex is being demolished. The City of Winter Park has also considered the site as a possible park site.
To see Winter Park as it should be seen, shell out five bucks and take a guided tour along the Winter Park Chain of Lakes. Scenic Boat Tours, headquartered at Dinky Dock near Rollins College, has been cruising these canals since 1938, offering regular folks a chance to peek into the backyards of the rich and occasionally famous.
SEMINOLE COUNTY
Land Area: 298 square miles
Persons Per Square Mile: 1,301
Population: 387,626
Population Increase (1990-2003): 74%
2005 Projected Population: 401,800
Mean Travel Time to Work: 27.0 minutes
Median Household Income: $45,388
Factoid: Henry Sanford, the founder of Sanford, was a man well ahead of his time. On his land, Sanford developed a citrus grove and experimental garden called Belair. Also, in 1880 he formed the Florida Land Colonization Co. in London to encourage European investment in Seminole County.
ALTAMONTE SPRINGS
Although Altamonte Springs was incorporated in 1920, its population totaled only 5,000 as recently as 1970. But that was before developers turned this erstwhile whistle stop into a thriving suburb.
Today, Altamonte Springs, population 42,300, is known primarily for the Altamonte Mall, the area's first regional mall, built in 1974, and for the presence of virtually every chain eatery in the world.
Many of the city's subdivisions can be found along Palm Springs Drive, Maitland Avenue and Montgomery Road, not far from the mall. Some of the older developments are nestled around hidden lakes that seem far removed from the hustle and bustle.
Multifamily housing also is plentiful, with no less than 30 apartment developments located within the city limits, primarily along Semoran Boulevard, also known as S.R. 436.
Apartment living, plus the convenience of shopping and entertainment venues, has made Altamonte Springs a popular place to live among young adults.
But because no city wants its identity tied entirely to a mall, local officials are focusing on a 25-acre Altamonte Springs Town Center, which would shift the focus away from the mall and toward adjacent Crane's Roost Park, which surrounds a 40-acre man-made lake.
The park already hosts community events, such as the city's huge Fourth of July celebration. And the lake, a converted borrow pit created during construction of the mall, is ringed by walkways and office buildings.
Plans call for an additional 1 million square feet of restaurants, stores, offices, condominium and apartments. And the development would be linked to nearby neighborhoods via a pedestrian bridge straddling busy S.R. 436.
CASSELBERRY
Founded by World War I veteran Hibbard Casselberry, who in 1926 bought 3,000 acres to grow ferns, Casselberry emerged as a suburban residential community after World War II.
By the time it was incorporated in 1965, Casselberry encompassed a number of family-oriented subdivisions and a budding business district near the intersection of S. R. 436 and U. S. Hwy. 17-92.
In the decades that followed, the city continued to grow-the population today stands at more than 22,000-but it became almost indistinguishable from surrounding unincorporated areas.
Finally, however, this quintessential bedroom community is set to reclaim its distinctive identity. A new City Center, slated for 14.7 acres on Triplett Lake Drive, will contain a community center as well as a restaurant, small shops and possibly town homes.
In addition, the park just north of City Hall is being revamped and expanded to include an amphitheater on Lake Concord. The new and improved facility will host the city's biannual jazz fest as well as a chili cook-off, art shows and other special events.
Casselberry's renaissance is also being bolstered by the redevelopment of the old Seminole Greyhound Park property off Seminole Boulevard. Legacy Park, which will contain 400 homes as well as commercial and retail space, is set to break ground later this year with Centex Homes as the primary builder.
Casselberry has 15 parks, more than two dozen lakes and a municipal golf course within its city limits. It's also home to Red Bug Lake Park, a 50-acre public space featuring nature trails, softball fields and lighted courts for tennis, racquetball and basketball.
LAKE MARY
Lake Mary is one of Central Florida's hottest growth areas, thanks in large part to the dogged persistence of Jeno Paulucci, a blustery, self-made millionaire who made his first fortune selling frozen Chinese food and a second one selling frozen pizza.
The city today sits at the epicenter of Florida's High Tech Corridor, which follows I-4 from Tampa through Seminole County and northeast to Daytona Beach and Melbourne.
Along the route, government and industry have joined forces to attract leading-edge companies in such fields as telecommunications, medical technology and microelectronics.
In Lake Mary, population 14,000, dozens of such companies have set up shop in several sprawling business centers that have combined to create a Central Florida version of Silicon Valley.
But it all started as an isolated railroad station known as Bents, the surname of a local grove owner. In 1900, industry arrived in Bents when Planters Manufacturing Company built a factory to produce starches, dextrines, farina and tapioca.
The facility was closed in 1910, however, and Bents-later renamed Lake Mary for the wife of a local pastor-seemed destined to remain an out-of-the-way country town.
That was the case for another half-century, until construction of I-4 and a successful campaign by community boosters to get a Lake Mary interchange tacked onto the project.
The resulting tracts of easily accessible land caught the eye of Jeno Paulucci, founder of Chun King, who in the late 1970s announced plans to build a luxurious residential development and business hub called Heathrow.
Few thought the audacious Paulucci would be successful, and the project floundered at first. But then the plainspoken old salesman quieted naysayers by persuading the American Automobile Association to relocate from suburban Washington, D.C., to his Heathrow Business Center.
The AAA coup, at that time Central Florida's most important corporate relocation in decades, jump-started Heathrow and opened the door for all the business and residential development that followed.
Of course, all those high-paid techies who now call Lake Mary home require upscale housing, which is easily found through an array of gated golf-course communities loaded with amenities such as swim and tennis clubs, private lakes and jogging trails through nature preserves.
Lake Mary officials are also redeveloping the old downtown area to better reflect the city's prosperous image. Plans call for a combination of government, commercial and residential space in Italian Mediterranean-style buildings. The existing park will be improved and a fountain added.
Yet another Lake Mary town center has been proposed for Colonial Town Park, a 175-acre mixed-use development at a new I-4 interchange.
LONGWOOD
Of all Seminole County's municipalities, Longwood, population 13,700, has the most history to preserve, and has done the best job of preserving it. But it's still a modern place, with a plethora of exclusive country club communities, office parks and shopping centers.
In 1873 a New Englander named Edward Henck homesteaded a tract of land that he named Longwood, after a Boston suburb he had helped to plan.
Henck was also the town's first postmaster and its first mayor. And in what may have been his spare time, Henck co-founded the South Florida Railroad and built a line connecting Sanford and Orlando. That venture enabled Longwood to boom as a citrus- and lumber-shipping center as well as a winter resort destination.
But as crucial as Henck was to Longwood's development, it was a carpenter named Josiah Clouser, a Henck employee, whose legacy is most visible. Clouser, a Pennsylvanian, constructed most of the buildings still standing in Longwood's remarkable historic district.
The district is a two-block area on Warren and Church avenues near the intersection of C.R. 427 and C.R. 434. Clauser's restored homes, including a "temporary" cottage he assembled from scrap lumber, are of particular interest.
Also notable is the so-called "Inside-Outside House," thought to be one of the first prefabricated homes in the United States. Built in Boston and assembled in Longwood in 1872, the structure is so named because the wall studs are visible on its exterior.
The Queen-Anne-styled Bradley-McIntyre House and the wood-frame vernacular-style Longwood Hotel, both of which Clouser helped to build, are also located in the historic district, as is the circa-1881 Christ Episcopal Church.
Popular annual events include the Longwood Arts and Crafts Festival, held the weekend before Thanksgiving, and the Founders Day Spring Arts and Crafts Festival, held in March.
On the outskirts of the city toward neighboring Apopka in Orlando" target="_blank">Orange County is Wekiva Springs State Park. And on General Hutchinson Avenue is Big Tree State Park, home of "The Senator," said to be the oldest and largest oak tree in the state.