farragutpress

Workshop considers masonry revision at West End Center

December 3, 2025 by Tammy Cheek

West End Center owners are hoping to add x building in the center’s parking lot.

As it is in the Mixed Use Town Center district, Town Community Development director Mark Shipley said the owners would be required to

provide 75 percent masonry on each building elevation.

The applicant Architecture Collaborative, on behalf of the owners, asked at a Thursday, Nov. 20, Farragut Municipal Planning Commission workshop segment of its regular meeting if they could provide for 75 percent masonry on the net façade area of the new buildings.

“I just want to say I’m very comfortable with this,” Commissioner Louise Povlin said. “We’ve changed our brick requirement at Anytime Fitness (shopping center) and trying to work around that (requirement). That building came out as well as could be expected.”

“I think it’s very important to have a cohesive look, particularly with this (West End Center) building,” she added.

“Also, because you are going to have traffic running behind it, the idea that you have that back of the building so nice (with brick), I think this is a perfect compromise,” Povlin said.

“We know this is going

to happen at Village Green (shopping center) as well,” she added.

“I echo the same thoughts,” Commissioner Jon Greene said. “I think it’s a good idea to have the flexibility to match the existing building.”

“We’ve really tried to make this building look good on all the sides with how visible it is,” said Dan Brittain, principal architect with Architecture Collaborative. “I think this is a good compromise … we appreciate you guys’ consideration on this.”

“I like what you’ve done,” Commission chairman Ron Pinchock said.

“I support this as well,” Commissioner Noah Myers said. “I appreciate the glazing you guys put on the back of the building. I think it will look nice.”

“Well, we knew this would happen eventually in one area or the other,” Mayor Ron Williams said. “I think trying to match it up, like [Commissioner] Povlin said, was kind of a deal (like) Anytime Fitness, where you had the first building and the second building and the third building.

“We had to try to match that up,” he said. “We need to try to do that here (at West End Center) as well.”

“(The new structure would be) situated at the south intersection of West End Avenue and West Point Drive,” Shipley said. “West End Center is an older shopping center with buildings that pre-date the formation of the Mixed Use Town Center land use area and associated regulations.

“One of the regulations in the zoning ordinance for new buildings within the MUTC is adherence to the Town Center Design Requirement for each exterior wall of a new building to maintain 75 percent minimum coverage with face brick,” he said. “Since the West End Center pre-dates this requirement, the existing buildings are well below the face brick percentage.

“In the Town’s adopted Architectural Design Standards, the building design standards for the Town Center subarea provide for the use of face brick on at least 75 percent of the net facade area,” Shipley said. “In this manner, the four building elevations can be averaged rather than each elevation being at least 75 percent face brick.

“This is the same application used outside the MUTC with the exception that masonry — and not just face brick — as defined in the ADS, can be used on at least 75 percent of the net facade area,” he said.

“The applicant would like to average the four elevations with face brick, as provided for in the ADS,” he said. “This would allow them to better blend architecturally the

new building to the existing older shopping center building while still having an

average of at least 75 percent face brick.”