Prominent retail developer Ben Carter, a Lovett School graduate and visionary behind several notable Atlanta area developments, died Sept. 15. He was 70 years old.
Locally, Carter envisioned the Streets of Buckhead, a proposed 600,000 square-foot mixed-use luxury district in the heart of Buckhead. Carter’s vision never fully came to fruition due to the Great Recession, but the development later became the Buckhead Village District and delivered on his plan for upscale development in the area.
Ben Carter Enterprises, which Carter founded in the early 1990s, spearheaded several notable retail developments in Georgia and the Southeast, including the 1.7 million-square-foot Mall of Georgia, Tanger Outlets Savannah, and the 1.4 million square-foot St. Johns Town Center in Jacksonville, Florida. He also led a revitalization of Savannah’s Broughton Street.
Imagining the ‘Streets of Buckhead’
Carter grew up in the Brookwood Hills area of Buckhead and was a Lovett School graduate. He turned his attention back to his hometown in the mid-2000s. He aimed to transform the then club scene around the heart of Buckhead into what was dubbed the “Rodeo Drive of the South,” a luxury district teeming with upscale shopping, restaurants and residences. Carter acquired 43 properties across eight blocks on or near East Paces Ferry, Peachtree, and Pharr roads. In 2007, demolition began on several properties at the center of the neighborhood’s infamous party scene.
Due to a legal dispute, the Streets of Buckhead was rebranded to “Buckhead Avenue.”
There were far greater issues on the horizon, however. The Great Recession brought progress on the visionary development to a crawl. Buckhead Avenue was originally slated to open in 2009, but financing delays continued to plague the development. In 2011, Ben Carter Properties elected to sell the properties due to the financial strains of the recession. It was purchased by California-based OliverMcMillan Inc.
“Ben made sure every vendor, lawyer, and contractor was paid at great cost,” according to an obituary published by Carter’s family in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
OliverMcMillan Inc. rebranded the site to “Buckhead Atlanta” and then, a year later, to “The Shops Buckhead Atlanta.” The first retailers and restaurants opened in 2014, maintaining Carter’s upscale vision. He told the AJC in 2014 the district was “substantially what we originally planned.”
OliverMcMillan Inc. sold “The Shops” to Atlanta-based Jamestown in 2019 amid struggles to attract foot traffic. The area, now known as the Buckhead Village District, has since rebounded to serve as a hub in Buckhead’s thriving retail and restaurant scene, including le Bilboquet, Le Colonial, Hermes, Buckhead Art and Co, and other local boutiques.
Carter was ‘vibrant and visionary’
Carter’s notable career began working with his father’s industrial brokerage firm, Carter & Associates. He founded Ben Carter Properties in 1993, creating over five million square feet of mixed-use projects around the Southeast. His obituary calls him “vibrant and visionary” and a pioneer of “lifestyle centers with developments that were created to be open air ‘people places’ in the community.”
Carter was a dedicated quail hunter and designed several bass lakes. He was also an avid traveler with a particular fondness for boats. He circumnavigated the globe three times with his family and friends, his obituary notes.
He founded the Carter Real Estate Center at the College of Charleston and served on the college’s Parent Advisory Council.
Carter was married to his wife, Patricia Reed Carter, for 47 years at the time of his death. He is survived by Patricia, their two children, and two grandchildren.
Jenny Pruitt, an icon of Atlanta real estate market, died Sept. 27 after a battle with cancer. Pruitt was 85.
Pruitt’s influence on the Atlanta real estate market, particularly in Buckhead, spanned 40 years. Pruitt carved her own path in the Atlanta market before founding Atlanta Fine Home – Sotheby’s International Realty, which grew to include more than 500 agents with over $3.7 billion in sales in 2023. Pruitt also served as Director of the Buckhead Coalition and was a dedicated philanthropist.
“Jenny was a true pillar of our city as a third-generation Atlantan, but she was also a prominent and legendary force in the real estate community at-large and genuinely made a difference in our city’s growth, development, and prosperity,” a statement from Atlanta Realtors Association (ARA), said. “Jenny Pruitt was so many things to so many of us.”
Pruitt’s self-made journey had humble beginnings. Her father died when Pruitt was a child, and her family scraped by while living with relatives. In a 2022 ARA interview, Pruitt said she gained an interest in real estate through her mother, who was in sales but “never very successful.” With limited means and encouragement from her mother, Pruitt saved enough money to attend business classes at Georgia State University. With a newly established business acumen, Pruitt began her real estate career in 1968 and quickly found success. Pruitt worked as an agent with Northside Realty, founded by late U.S. Sen. Johnny Isakson, before serving as a manager with Buckhead Brokers for five years. The firm was the top brokerage for sales in Atlanta during Pruitt’s tenure with a staff of 90 associates.
In 1988, she established Jenny Pruitt & Associates and furthered her indelible mark on the Buckhead real estate community. The company, founded along with her husband, Bob, specialized in the Buckhead market and its upscale residences. Founded ahead of a recession, Pruitt said the company continued to grow despite its inauspicious start. It continued to be a top firm in Atlanta real estate market with annual sales of over $1.5 billion with six metro Atlanta offices.
After catapulting her own brokerage, Pruitt sold the company in 2001 to a company under the umbrella of billionaire investor and Berkshire Hathaway CEO Warren Buffett. Despite starting over, Pruitt’s second venture proved to be even more successful.
Pruitt founded Atlanta Fine Homes- Sotheby’s International Realty in 2007, chosen by Sotheby’s International Realty Affiliates, Inc. as its exclusive Atlanta affiliate, with business partner and son-in-law David Boehmig. Atlanta Fine Homes has nearly 600 sales associates in four offices in metro Atlanta. According to the company’s website, it is the metro’s top brokerage with $3.7 billion in annual sales.
Pruitt earned a bevy of awards throughout her career. Pruitt was selected as an E.A. Isakson Award recipient for “upholding the highest standards of integrity and professionalism,” the Sally Washburn Lifetime Achievement Award, Georgia Small Business Person of the Year and Realtor of the Year. She was also inducted into the Business Hall of Fame at Georgia State University, the YWCA Academy of Women Achievers, and Junior Achievement Hall of Fame. She was named a Four Pillar Award winner in 2016 by The Council for Quality Growth, which recognizes the pillars to be quality, responsibility, vision, and integrity, and celebrates her philanthropic endeavors as well as significant contributions to economic development in Metro Atlanta.
Pruitt and her husband, Bob, were married in 1966. Pruitt credited Bob with giving her the push that ultimately led to the founding of Jenny Pruitt & Associates. The couple had two daughters, seven grandchildren, and a great-granddaughter.
In 2015, Pruitt penned “Beneath His Wings,” a memoir in which she discussed the struggles of her youth to her rise to prominence, through which she was driven by her faith. Pruitt’s faith and business success drove her numerous philanthropic efforts. She founded a scholarship for students at Georgia State University and founded the Buckhead Girls Club, which provided local community and cultural funding.
“Jenny was truly legendary in Atlanta real estate, but more than that, she was a woman of deep faith and kindness,” Atlanta Fine Homes Realtor Thomas House posted on Facebook.
Pruitt was also an active community member. She is the former Director of the Buckhead Coalition and served on various leadership boards, including for the Carter Center, the Atlanta Police Foundation and the Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce.
“At her very core, Jenny was the embodiment of a servant leader and always ensured that other people’s highest needs were being served before hers,” a statement from ARA said.
For almost half a century, Buckhead has maintained a love affair with Atlanta Ballet. With several Buckhead studio locations over the years, today Atlanta Ballet’s Buckhead Centre is located in the Chastain Square Shopping Center.
On the last day of September, Buckhead’s St. Regis hotel once again hosted Atlanta Ballet’s annual Corps de Ballet Fashion Show and Luncheon. Buckhead’s own Neiman Marcus presented the clothes for the fashion runway show. The event grossed almost half a million dollars that will go to support educational dance programs and community outreach dance programs offered at various Atlanta schools and Atlanta Ballet’s Buckhead Centre.
For those who adore dressing up and spending time with good friends, this year’s Corps de Ballet Fashion Show and Luncheon did not disappoint. Actually, it was more than lunch and friends. It was an intimate ballet performance and a Neiman Marcus fashion show. The luncheon always has this way of making us attendees feel deeply beautiful.
The moment I strolled into the St. Regis hotel, I was ushered to the check-in line, which happened to curve up an elegant grand staircase leading to the St. Regis’ well-appointed Mezzanine. The grand staircase rivaled the steps Grace Kelly glided down in the movie To Catch A Thief. You know the ones, in the iconic Hotel Carlton on the French Riviera. After taking my place in the check-in line, a sterling silver tray appeared and I was gifted a flute of bubbly. Right then, I felt I’d fallen into a fairy tale. And maybe I had.
It’s not that the St. Regis lunch fare wasn’t memorable, it just quickly became overshadowed by what the charming afternoon unabashedly gave us. We clapped, murmured, and sometimes boomed as the models sauntered down the center stage showcasing the fall season’s must-haves.
When the ballet dancers arrived, a hush fell over our world. We saw the gleam in the dancers’ eyes, we were that close. They mesmerized us. We thought of nothing except them.
Then the music stopped. We became greedy and wanted more. But bows and curtsies happened. The stage went bare. Two-and-a-half hours passed like eleven minutes. No one left. We had to linger. The tables were long cleared off before the last group of ladies and two men were finally, kindly, ushered away.
After returning home, I stepped out of my shoes. But I waited to change clothes. I needed to relish in the enchanting day just one hour longer because it seemed impossible to wait a full 365 days until I get the chance to feel like Grace Kelly again. The day was that special.
Not only is Buckhead home to Atlanta Ballet’s annual Corps de Ballet Fashion and Luncheon, Buckhead has housed Atlanta Ballet studios for decades. As a teenager, I took ballet at their Cains Hill Place studio. That location was so perfectly located for my sweet tooth because in between classes I snuck away and ran up the street to Irby Avenue’s Henri’s Bakery. There, I’d purchase a colossal cream horn, exactly like the ones Henri’s still sells in their pastry cases.
Today, Atlanta Ballet’s Buckhead Centre in the Chastain Square Shopping Center offers classes for all ages, from Tiny Dancer classes for two year olds through Silver Swans for students aged 55 and older. 4279 Roswell Road, 404-303-1501. https://centre.atlantaballet.com
The spirit of Buckhead heads forward. This is the way it has been, and perhaps this is the way it will always be. The spirit of Buckhead points forward. You see it in the way we work, and you see it in the way we play. The reach is always extending further. The search is for excellence and beauty and grace and vibrancy.
We are a community of individuals. We are diverse, we are dynamic, and we are discerning. We are builders. We are connected to one another with a common bond. A common dream. A common quest. Pointing life in one direction. Forward.
