Living in Berry Hill

Berry Hill is a roughly half-square-mile satellite city tucked between 8th Avenue South, I-65, and Melrose, just south of Music Row. It is a longtime cluster of recording studios, small office bungalows, and creative businesses rather than a residential subdivision. The single largest project reshaping it is a proposed entertainment-production and education campus anchored by Universal Music Group, estimated at about $250 million. The concept plan was presented to City of Berry Hill officials and community stakeholders on December 4, 2023 (about 75 stakeholders attended), and the local zoning commission approved the concept plan on first reading in early January 2024.

The campus is planned across roughly 4.14 acres assembled from about 17 parcels along Columbine Place and East Iris Drive, near Columbine Park. According to the submitted concept plan, it would include on the order of 93,500 square feet of studios, about 115,000 square feet of education and office space, roughly 3,200 square feet of retail, about 20,500 square feet across two restaurant spaces, and four residential 'producer cottage' units, supported by 400-plus parking spaces. The plan also calls for an expansion of Columbine Park as part of the development's public space.

UMG already operates East Iris Studios in the area (the former House of Blues studio, which UMG acquired in 2019). The properties are owned collectively by UMG and other Berry Hill owners including East-Iris Columbine LLC and Berry Hill Development LLC, with Sylmar Studios and an entity affiliated with Dallas-based Xebec also part of the project; ESa is the listed architect and Kimley-Horn the civil engineer. Marketing materials describe state-of-the-art recording and video studios, an audio-technology research-and-development lab, and a scoring stage billed as the first of its kind in the central U.S. The education component has been described as potentially serving area universities, including Middle Tennessee State University.

As of mid-2025, the project remained in the planning and property-assembly phase rather than under construction; the Nashville Post reported on June 30, 2025 that UMG had paid $1.985 million for an additional Berry Hill commercial property adjacent to the site. No public groundbreaking or completion date has been announced. For buyers and relocators evaluating Berry Hill, this matters because it signals the enclave's continued direction as a creative-industry and mixed-use district. Anyone relying on specific figures or timing should confirm current status with the City of Berry Hill, since the concept plan's square footages and acreage have shifted slightly across iterations and the project is not yet permitted or built.