Community & Real Estate
Letting the land be our guide

Lake Martin enthusiasts are truly blessed, in multiple ways.  We are blessed with a beautiful lake with 750 miles of shoreline, 44,000 acres of water surface with sparkling clean water.  The lake is so special it has been designated as a “Treasured Alabama Lake” by the Alabama Department of Environment Management.  Lovers of Lake Martin are proud of that designation and enjoy the use of these pristine waters.

But we are blessed beyond just the lake.  The land that extends beyond the shoreline is beautiful as well.  The Appalachian foothills provide more than a watershed for the lake, it provides rolling land and dense forest that is so beautiful it would be called “Treasured Alabama Lands” if such a designation so existed.  We believe that is especially true on the 25,000 acres that comprise Russell Lands On Lake Martin.

For years, Ben Russell, the visionary leader of the Russell Lands companies, has preached, “Let the land tell you how to build.”  Given the treasured natural resources and Ben’s direction, we “let the land guide us” on what to build, how to build it and even what to build it with.  Over the past several years, that has been refined, resulting in a new, more environmentally friendly approach to everything we do.

A New Direction in Development
A few years ago we realized standard development practices, well intentioned for traffic flow and city life, were actually damaging to the eco-structure of our area.  When we contemplated new roads into Willow Glynn for instance, we found that the county-specified development standards would actually destroy beautiful native timber and create greater volumes of storm water than is sensible for Lake Martin. This led us to find mutually beneficial solutions, such as narrower streets utilizing native stone retaining walls to protect trees and root systems, preserving an impressive stand of native hardwoods and pines. 

New Direction in Home Building
Prior to the sale of any homesite, our land planners now survey each lot locating the perfect building site and creating an inventory of every tree. The purpose of this survey is to “let the land tell us” how to place the house with the correct design for the shape of the land and the trees on the property. Try as we might to save trees, inevitably a few specimen trees must go.

This was the case in Ridge Run where you will find our newest completed homes. Rather than send the trees to the pulp mill, we started our own sawmill to use the native trees for building materials in the home. The uses range from small brackets to big beams, such as those at SpringHouse restaurant. 

When building lake homes that fit into the environment, we find that native stone is preferred over imported brick or cultured stone.  The extensive use of this material visually ties the structure to the ground on the exterior, while providing warm hearths in the heart of the interior.

This process of “letting the land guide us” extends to the all important waterfront as well.  We ask everyone to carefully consider how to get from the house to the waterfront via gentle stone paths or carefully placed foot paths. With a bit of extra consideration, we even find opportunities to protect the shoreline. What some might consider a stone outcropping, for instance, we turn into a stone entry into the lake.

Our respect for the lake, the land and Ben Russell's maxim has allowed us to create some very ecologically attractive properties in recent years, in both The Ridge and Willow Glynn. These properties are being enjoyed by many and provide direction for the future.  In a time of some uncertainty, it is great to know that, right now and forever, we have the only real guide we need.  We have been blessed with the lake and the land.  All we have to do is “let the land be our guide.”