THE PROMISE OF SOUTHLANDS

Many of us grew up with the experience of growing food—a farm owned by grandparents or a kitchen garden and fruit tree in your backyard. We understood and appreciated food well before we ate it, as we pulled potatoes from the garden or watched Mom or Dad make jam.

But most of us have lost touch with farms and growing food. The global economics of food and agriculture mean there are fewer family farms and fewer connections to agriculture in our society. In a world with plentiful food, we often lack the sense of connection we once had to how food arrives on the table.

If we could create a place where farming and food could energize a neighbourhood then, in a modern sense, we could reestablish something we lost. That is the promise of Southlands—that we try to make those connections and reestablish the culture of agriculture in a new sense of place.

Come for the homes we build but stay for the connection to farming and food we want to help create.

Sean Hodgins, President, Century Group

LIFE AT SOUTHLANDS

Southlands is just across the street from Boundary Bay Regional Park and Centennial Beach. More than 530 acres, it is North America’s largest community deliberately rooted in food and farming, and 80% of the site is now public land. Land use is modelled on traditional agrarian villages, placing homes next to small organic farms that feed their communities.

Southlands filters the farming lifestyle through a modern, slightly urban lens. Residents will walk to the Market District and meet for coffee or take in an outdoor performance. They’ll walk and cycle 4km of multi-use pathways and roam 100 acres of parkland. They’ll also live close to nature, watching barn swallows dive over the fields, picnicking on the beach, and gazing at stars.

With a diverse selection of 950 homes, people of varying life stages will put down roots here. But more than just a place to live, Southlands is a place to make a life.