Drive past the corner of Midlothian Turnpike and Alverser Drive right now and you'll see finished buildings with no signage, a grocery store shell with lights on inside, and parking spaces painted for cars that haven't shown up yet. If you've been half-following this project since it was first announced, you probably have a mental list of what's supposed to fill those buildings. Part of that list is already wrong.
Midlothian Depot has been public knowledge for a year and a half, long enough for the original tenant roster to shift more than once before a single door has opened. That's not a criticism of the project. It's just how retail development actually works, and it matters if you're the kind of person who plans a Saturday around what you read in a headline six months ago.
The building is finished. The tenant list from last year isn't.
When Whole Foods was first confirmed as the anchor for Midlothian Depot in January 2025, the developer's flyer named a handful of tenants alongside it, including furniture retailer Lovesac and eye care chain MyEyeDr. That MyEyeDr space no longer belongs to MyEyeDr. Warby Parker took it over instead, according to SJC Ventures principal Jeff Garrison.
A bigger name dropped out entirely. Cooper's Hawk Winery & Restaurant, a full sit-down concept, had been part of the plan. It exited the project following a legal dispute with the developer that has since been settled. If you were picturing a wine bar as part of your new grocery run, that particular plan is gone.
This is the part most "what's coming to Midlothian Depot" roundups skip, because most of them are just copying the current tenant list without checking what it looked like a year ago. A list that changes is more useful to know about than a list that just gets repeated.
What's actually confirmed for this fall
As of early August 2026, here's the lineup SJC Ventures and the property's newly hired management firm are standing behind:
- Whole Foods Market, a 36,000-square-foot store that will be the grocery chain's first location in Chesterfield County, joining existing Richmond-area stores in Short Pump and the city.
- J.Crew, Warby Parker, and Lovesac on the retail side
- Petfolk (veterinary clinic), VIO (med spa), and Gloss Nails
- Dave's Hot Chicken, Paris Baguette, Blue Fish Grill, Turning Point, and Cheba Hut for food
The county issued Whole Foods its tenant-upfit permit in early 2026, meaning the buildout for the store's interior is actively underway. The first businesses at the development are expected to open this fall at the earliest, with the full project continuing to fill in through 2027. That's a meaningful window. If your plan is "Whole Foods opens Labor Day weekend," you may be waiting into winter. If your plan is "everything opens at once," you'll be visiting a half-finished center for months while remaining spaces fill in one lease at a time.
Sixty townhomes with garages are also planned along Old Buckingham Road as part of the same 13-acre site, which SJC Ventures bought for $16 million in January 2025. At the project's outset, the developer estimated the total cost at roughly $100 million, with more than $70 million of that tied to the commercial buildings alone.
Three miles down Midlothian Turnpike, the same story in miniature
If Midlothian Depot is the big, visible version of "confirmed doesn't mean permanent," the space at 12646 Stone Village Way is the compact version, and it's worth knowing because it's already been through two identities before its third one even opens.
That address sits inside Stonehenge Village Shopping Center, the Wegmans-anchored center off Midlothian Turnpike. It first opened as a Growler USA location, then rebranded to 101 Crafthouse, which ran there for about five years before closing in 2025. The space sat empty for months. Now it's about to become the local outpost of Barrel House, a beer-focused restaurant chain based in Iowa.
This will be Barrel House's eighth location overall and its first anywhere near Richmond. Most of the chain's existing spots are in Iowa, with a couple more in Illinois and Frisco, Texas. Bringing it here is a group of four local partners, Rajbans Joshi, Satish Mishra, Pooja Malu, and Vakul Goel, the last of whom is also the local franchisee behind the Celebree School daycare chain. Joshi described what drew the group in after visiting one of the Midwest locations:
"The huge barrels that's part of their decor just gave it a different feel."
Joshi is targeting a November or December opening, with a staff of about 20. His group's franchise agreement also allows for additional Richmond-area locations if this one works, which means the 101 Crafthouse space might end up being the first of several rather than a one-off replacement.
Why the same corner keeps changing hands
None of this is unique to Midlothian. Grocery-anchored development is having a moment across the whole western side of the region right now. Whole Foods at Midlothian Depot will be Chesterfield's first, but Publix is separately planning a store near Brandermill, and Trader Joe's is expected to anchor a redevelopment of the former Genworth campus over in Henrico. Three different grocers, three different corners, all moving at roughly the same time.
What that tells you as a resident isn't that Chesterfield is suddenly flush with grocery options overnight. It's that every one of these projects is running on its own permitting and construction timeline, and every one of them is subject to the same kind of tenant churn Midlothian Depot has already shown. A name in a press release from a year ago is a plan, not a ribbon cutting.
What this actually means for your fall
If you live near this corridor, here's the practical version of all this:
- Don't build weekend plans around a specific opening date for Whole Foods yet. "This fall" is the developer's own language, and the earlier Cooper's Hawk exit shows plans here have moved before.
- Treat the tenant list as a snapshot, not a guarantee, especially for anything that isn't already under construction. Warby Parker replacing MyEyeDr happened quietly, with no announcement of the swap itself, just an updated flyer.
- If you've been driving past the empty 101 Crafthouse sign wondering what's next, mark November or December for Barrel House, and expect it to lean into a lower-key, sports-bar-adjacent vibe based on what its own franchisees say drew them to the concept.
The corner of Midlothian Turnpike and Alverser Drive, and the storefront a few miles away at Stonehenge Village, are both proof of the same thing: retail here isn't static, even inside a single project. Buildings get finished before leases get finalized, and leases get finalized before the announced tenant actually shows up. Watching that unfold is part of what it means to actually live along this stretch of road right now, rather than just reading a headline about it once.
If you're weighing a move to this part of Chesterfield and want a read on what these openings mean for daily convenience or long-term value in specific neighborhoods nearby, The Lemus Group knows this corridor block by block, in both English and Spanish. Start your Richmond home search — bilingual support available.
