The Rise of Culinary Centric Community Development

Interview

Key Takeaways

The country's first culinary-centric community:

Agrihoods exist, but CERES Chatt Hills is something different — food woven into every layer of the development, from 90% edible landscaping to a chef incubator to foraging trails through rewilded woods. Market studies peg an anticipated 20% price premium above the closest neighbors, Serenbe and Trilith, and the team notes they are seeing results come in above that underwritten assumption.

Demand is validating before a shovel hits the ground:

Ten percent of homes are already under contract with escrow in place — secured without a construction schedule or architectural renderings. Close to 90 inquiries for homes since groundbreaking, with the sales team in a sprint to respond. Buyers are coming from New York, Los Angeles, Miami, San Francisco, Canada, and even Spain, drawn by both the food concept and 30-minute proximity to Atlanta's airport.

Supply is structurally constrained by design:

Chattahoochee Hills zoning requires 70% green space preservation, which limits density across the entire area. The 94-acre site sits inside one of the most restrictively zoned municipalities in the country, with 150-foot road buffers and design standards that apply to all development in the area.

The financial model is anchored in for-sale residential, not food:

The primary revenue driver is lot, home, and condo sales — ranging from the mid-$400s for lofts up to $3.5 million-plus for single-family homes — against a $188 million Phase 1 development cost. The team is targeting 30%+ IRRs with an approximate 2x equity multiple and a completion timeline through 2029. The chef incubator, while central to the concept, is a separate business that leases its space as any other commercial tenant would.

The

CERES

Team

Dominique Love

Dominique is Founder and CVO of CERES. A visionary in culinary-driven placemaking, she developed the integrated culinary ecosystem model that sits at the heart of CERES Chattahoochee Hills — weaving edible landscaping, a five-acre truffle orchard, and an innovative approach to the chef incubator into the fabric of a residential community. Her thesis: food is the single most powerful social connector humans have, and no one has built a community around it yet.

Ellen Buckley

Ellen is Managing Partner and CDO at CERES. With deep roots in community development and residential design, she has been instrumental in translating the CERES culinary vision into a buildable, scalable platform. With Phase I construction launching in 2026 and 10% of homesites already reserved, she is turning a bold idea into a functioning gourmet cluster — and a replicable model for the American Sunbelt.

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