Drive down Hillsboro Pike past the mall this month and you will see scaffolding along one side of the building and a construction fence tracing the edge of the parking deck. Cross the street to Vertis and you will see a crew finishing glasswork on a new restaurant entrance that faces the courtyard. Walk two minutes further to Hill Center and nothing looks different at all, because the change there already happened last year.
That is the thing about Green Hills right now. Three separate commercial properties, all within a few blocks of each other, are each mid-cycle on their own renovation schedule, and none of those schedules line up. If you only shop at one of them, you have probably missed what is happening at the other two.
Three Buildings, Three Different Clocks
The Mall at Green Hills, Vertis, and Hill Center Green Hills are not one shopping district with three entrances. They are three different owners running three different playbooks, and this summer happens to be the moment all three are visibly in motion.
Simon Property Group owns and operates the mall. In February 2026, Simon announced an investment of more than $250 million split across three of its properties nationally, with The Mall at Green Hills as one of them, alongside Cherry Creek Shopping Center in Denver and International Plaza in Tampa. The plan calls for two-story flagship entrances and what the release describes as jewel-box spaces for luxury boutiques. Construction is expected to begin this year, and the shopping and dining currently underway inside the mall is expected to continue through the work.
Vertis is a different animal entirely. It is a mixed-use tower built by Southern Land Company at the corner of Hillsboro Pike and Richard Jones Road, and its ground floor has quietly become the neighborhood's steakhouse-and-now-Italian corridor. Hill Center, meanwhile, is an open-air lifestyle center that Nashville Scene readers voted the city's best shopping center, and its most recent additions arrived without any fanfare about square footage or investment figures at all.
Here is the split, as it stands this month:
| Property | What's changing | What it means if you're already local |
|---|---|---|
| The Mall at Green Hills | $250M exterior and interior redevelopment, construction starting 2026 | More apparel and accessories brands landing throughout the year, but expect scaffolding on your usual walk in |
| Vertis | Char (established 2018) joined by Lupo Notte, a new Italian concept | Two full dinner options now live in the same courtyard, no mall trip required |
| Hill Center | Rejuvenation and Taco Bamba added over the past year | The open-air center keeps adding tenants without touching its own footprint |
What's Actually Happening Inside the Mall
The mall's own tenant list reads like a fashion calendar more than a construction update. According to a rundown from Williamson Source, the year has moved in stages. Coach opened in mid-May. Oota Egyptian Eatery followed in late May. Vuori arrived in June, Mountain High Outfitters in July. Burberry is relocating within the mall this month, which means if you have looked for it in its old spot recently and come up empty, that is why. Edikted is slated for September and Rowan for later in the fall.
Notice what is missing from that list. Aside from Oota, almost every name is apparel, footwear, or accessories. SKIMS, Hollister, a relocated Altar'd State, State & Liberty, and Kendra Scott have all already opened. Coach, Vuori, Burberry, Edikted, and Rowan round out a lineup that is overwhelmingly about what you wear, not where you eat.
Eric Sadi, Co-President of North American Real Estate at Simon, framed the investment simply: "These centers are already top retail destinations in the country." The redevelopment is designed to sharpen that position further, not to diversify what the mall is for.
The Food Scene Skipped the Mall Entirely
If the mall is becoming more purely a retail destination, the restaurant activity in Green Hills has landed almost entirely at its two neighbors instead.
At Vertis, Char has anchored the building's food and drink identity since it opened there on September 17, 2018, a Southern-style steakhouse from 4 Top Hospitality, the same group behind Etch and Amerigo, with a piano bar that runs nightly and a main dining room that seats 140. This summer, Southern Land Company announced its first affiliate-owned and operated restaurant concept for the same building. Lupo Notte, an Italian concept, is set to open from Vertis this summer, according to a Nashville Post report, giving the building two full-service restaurants inside the same courtyard for the first time.
Hill Center has been adding to its own roster on a quieter timeline. Rejuvenation, the lighting and home furnishings retailer, debuted there in August 2025. Taco Bamba, the D.C.-based taco concept from chef Jackie Gutierrez-Jones, opened as the brand's thirteenth location. Neither arrival came with a press release about redevelopment dollars. They simply opened, and Hill Center kept its open-air layout exactly as it was.
A third address worth knowing if you eat out in Green Hills regularly is Bedford Commons, home to etc., chef Deb Paquette's second restaurant after Etch, open for lunch and dinner Monday through Friday and dinner on Saturday. It is a smaller, more adventurous menu than Char's steakhouse formality, and it sits far enough from both the mall and Vertis that most people treat it as its own destination rather than part of either cluster.
Put those three addresses together and a pattern emerges that no single tenant announcement would tell you on its own. The mall is optimizing for shopping. Vertis and Hill Center are absorbing nearly all of the neighborhood's new restaurant energy. If you have been waiting for a sit-down dinner option to show up inside the mall itself, the current construction cycle is not aimed at giving you one.
One Saturday in September When None of This Applies
All three of these properties answer to a landlord, a design firm, or a national retail strategy. Green Hills Park does not.
The tenth annual Green Hills Park Festival returns on Saturday, September 12, at Green Hills Park on Lone Oak Road. It is free, family and pet friendly, and organized by Friends of Green Hills Park, an all-volunteer nonprofit that has run the event since it started nearly a decade ago. Past years have featured local vendors, live music, food trucks, and an outdoor movie to close the night, with proceeds going back into park improvements rather than into anyone's redevelopment budget.
It is worth marking on the calendar for a reason beyond the entertainment. The festival is the one annual event in Green Hills that has nothing to do with which building is under construction or which brand just relocated. It runs regardless of what Simon does to the mall's facade or what opens next at Vertis. For a neighborhood currently experiencing three unrelated renovation timelines at once, that kind of constancy is rarer than it sounds.
What This Adds Up To
None of this is really one story about Green Hills getting a facelift. It is three separate stories that happen to be running at the same time in the same zip code. The mall is becoming a more concentrated retail destination while staying open through construction that will likely stretch well past this year. Vertis and Hill Center are quietly becoming where the neighborhood actually eats. And the park festival keeps happening every September regardless of any of it.
If you already live here, that distinction is the useful part. You do not need to track all three timelines to enjoy the neighborhood. You just need to know which building you are walking into and what to expect from it this particular month.
Whenever the conversation turns from what's new around Green Hills to what your own property is worth in the middle of it, Heather Hamel is glad to talk it through. Begin a private consultation whenever you are ready.
