VILLAGE GARDENS, SARASOTA

Village Gardens is surprisingly easy to miss. Turn off Old Bradenton Road, drive along it's tree-lined entrance, over the narrow bridge, and the surroundings change immediately. Towering pines and mature oaks shade the winding road. A pond and fountain sit among tropical plantings near the clubhouse, pool and other amenities, while the homes themselves are nestled throughout, beneath the tree canopy.

The main road makes a broad loop through the community, with smaller lanes branching off into clusters of duplex-style homes. In places, the road divides around a mature tree. It's remarkably peaceful - tidy, quiet and established. People wave and smile. Neighbors greet one another with genuine care. When the weather is nice, residents walk the loop in the evening, sometimes with their dogs and sometimes simply walking and talking together. 

The sense of community here goes deeper than friendly neighbors. Village Gardens has a remarkable feeling of extended family - and in many cases, that's literally what it is. Multi-generations of families and and long-time family friends have all found homes here, sometimes after visiting relatives in the community for decades. Some residents have owned more than one Village Garden home rather than leave the neighborhood. That history creates something increasingly difficult to manufacture in a newer development: continuity. Village Gardens doesn't just have a neighborhood association. It has a neighborhood memory. 

You may occasionally hear an airplane overhead or a passing train, that's part of living Downtown, but inside the community the overwhelming impression is trees, gardens and quiet. And yet Village Gardens sits close to Sarasota-Bradenton International Airport, the Ringling Museum and Ca' D'Zan, New College, Downtown Sarasota, Siesta Key and Gulf Coast Beaches and the UTC area an easy drive in the other direction. It's one of those places where the map doesn't really describe what it feels like to live here.