Southern Village

This is just another dime-​a-​dozen preplanned village in the Triangle. Now, I love a lot of the shops in here – don’t get me wrong. But the village itself lacks personality based on my few visits. It’s out in the country – far away from downtown Chapel Hill. There are some office spaces, but mostly the village has restaurants and other businesses. Behind it is a neighborhood.
Parking is plentiful, and it’s decently designed so that it doesn’t feel like the handful of shops/​restaurants are swallowed up by the giant parking lot. However, the whole area seems to lack personality or anything to give it character.

Southern Village has a lot of good things:
1. Weaver Street Market
2. La Vita Dolce
3. The Lumina Theater
4. The outdoor movies at the Lumina Theater.
They also have a Subway, which is cool. I haven’t been to any of the other places here. Parking’s not too bad.
I also once went to a pig roast at the Park & Ride Lot, and no one made us break up the pig roast, so win on that end.

Cool Village! Welcome to Stepford??? No! Not exactly! La Vita Dolce has the BEST Gelato in the Triangle!!! Merlion… A Singaporean Restaurant! They have their own Church! Did I miss the Chocolate Shop??? The Gelateria makes up for Many missing shops! I’ll be back for this Gelato and check out the Coffee and cookies at La Vita Dolce!

Southern village has a fake downtown vibe with cheesy seasonal decorations. The whole mass produced «village» has three great things downtown pazzo pizzeria, the lumina theater and last but not least weaver street witch only exists because the thousands of suburban house wife’s can’t find anything else to complain about so they sit in there houses witch are 4 feet away sending email complaints to the city council that say” I can’t drive to the grocery store I have to walk“it was the same thing with carrboro high school witch is filled with druggies and drunks who get a little tipsy and go rob the closest house hiding this from there parents who’s houses consist of only plastic and concrete it’s almost as if they rented a fleet of helicopters and flew the whole plastic town to the 10 acre deforested lot then the bostoners migrated because there sick of seeing all of the bum’s and beggars all over the street so they move here to infest our local economy with overpriced nicknacks and coffee with no idea that there’s any life out of the village i apologize for no punctuation

Southern village is like the Cary of Chapel Hill. Its trendy and in a fake downtown like architecture as has been spattered about the retail and office landscape of late. Its gem is the Lumina theatre which is a cozy place to see mainstream films as well as its centre where films are screened in the summer. There are a few decent restaurants but the shops are lame and not worth the drive. The Weaver Street Market is actually not bad and I frequent the other two with great regularity. Its an ok market but again not worth the ride to southern village. I guess if you live there it could be nice to walk to some restaurants and the market.

good restaurants all in one village square (Merlion has wonderful variety of Asian/​Singapore, noodles, seafood, — I’m really picky about Asian food & don’t like regular Chinese restaurants) — & I wish I could eat here every week.
Pazzo’s is actually quiet enough to have a conversation even when the restaurant is full! I’m hooked on their Rainbow Trout stuffed with olives and artichokes… we take company here & have never had a disappointing meal. Very nice bar, too
Lumina Theatre is so nice and this Village has music on lawn all summer (Sundays) & movies outside on Fri & Sat. Some nice stores (Bloom & Cottage Shop) so you can skip the shopping center.

I don’t really think of Southern Village so much a shopping center as a fabricated main street, which I guess was the developers’ intention. There are tons of different businesses in the area and it really seems like there was an effort made to ensure that the residents don’t ever have to leave. Southern Village houses doctors, dentists, real estate and insurance agents, and a branch of Chapel Hill’s own Harrington Bank. There are quite a few restaurants, including Italian place Pazzo, the sportsy Town Hall Grill, and La Vita Dolce, which specializes in espresso and gelato. Southern Village also claims the Lumina Theatre, which I think has a better and more eclectic selection than any other cinema in the area. On Friday and Saturday nights, they show outdoor movies on the lovely lawn in the middle of the main shopping square, which is a fun and cheap ($ 3) activity for all ages.

This is a great place to go with friends or (more likely) family when the weather is nice to shop and just hang around. There’s a nice grassy area that has events at night (music, etc) which draws some surprisingly good material. One of the best book shops around is here, as well as La Vita Dolce, which I love to death (as does everyone who goes there). The vibe here is happy and prosperous in all the right ways.
Lastly, they get props from me for branching out in the types of stores they have… It’s refreshing to me to go to a shopping center and not have to wade through women’s clothing stores to get to the good stuff.

Though it’s a bit out of the way (I always forget there’s more to Chapel Hill than just the campus!), Southern Village can be a real treat. They host regular movies on the green and have a music series in the spring/​summer and even an occasional theater production. Though it’s not particularly large compared to other area centers, it has some gems. Merlion, one of the only Singaporean restaurants in the area; Market Place Books; and La Vita Dolce. Plus there’s a Lumina and the only O2 in Chapel Hill. Fashion shopping is pretty non-​existent here, though there are some stores for housewares, arts, and crafts.