- January 28, 2026
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The Old Packing House on Tildenville Road will have new life.
The Winter Garden City Commission unanimously approved Thursday, Jan. 22, a site plan for 1061, 1063 and 1065 Tildenville School Road.
The proposal from Crown Property Holdings owner Gary Hasson includes maintaining many of the five existing historic industrial structures nestled between the West Orange Trail and Tildenville Elementary School.
Hasson has been planning for nearly eight years to revitalize the historic citrus-packing plant, which was built as part of the South Lake Apopka Citrus Growers Association. The plant’s days of processing citrus ended in the 1990s.
The commission initially approved the plan for the Old Packing House in 2019 with its completion in 2021, but the supply shortages and rising costs after the COVID-19 pandemic caused delays.
The plan is to re-purpose and renovate those buildings to include retail, restaurants and professional office spaces, as well as a permanent natural history exhibit. The parking will be reconfigured, and some landscaping areas will be added as well as a new sidewalk on Tildenville School Road. There also will be an incorporation of golf cart and bike facilities as well as the installation of new outdoor seating areas.
According to the Old Packing House’s website, food categories that have either signed or are pending for the development include individual fresh baked pizza and calzones, coffee, Asian specialties, authentic Italian delicatessen, Mediterranean, homemade ice cream and a Mexican taqueria.
The office spaces offered will be diverse, including virtual offices to fixed single to multi-person, according to the website.
The Natural History Museum will feature prehistoric fossils and ice age minerals, including a jaw of a Megalodon, the head of a Siberian woolly rhinoceros, the rear leg and foot of a woolly mammoth, the full skeleton of a North American bison and a rare pair of mammoth tusks.
“As we’ve said and planned all along, the vision for the Old Packing House is to be much more than a food court, a co-lab or an events center,” representatives wrote on the website. “We will be opening a remarkable community-oriented marketplace with an entire array of music, the arts, special events, holiday celebrations and so much more. The OPH will be a destination you will visit over and over again.”
Kelly Carson, the city’s planning director, said the project is consistent with the property’s Planned Community Development zoning requirements.
“Nothing in the PCD is being amended, and the approved uses have not changed,” she said.
The proposal also is consistent with the city’s comp plan and code of ordinances.
The City Commission unanimously approved a resolution for a minor amendment to the Winter Garden Hotel Planned Community Development zoning.
Commissioner Iliana Ramos abstained.
The amendment is for a site plan of about .58 acres of property located at 8 N. Highland Ave. on the northwest corner of North Highland Avenue and West Plant Street.
The amendment extends the site plan approval and Architectural Review & Historical Preservation Board approval, addresses the expired status of the impact fee deferral and forgiveness agreement, and addresses off-site parking requirements.
Carson said the previous agreement to waive the project’s impact fees is being terminated, and the developer will be required to account for the project’s parking needs by paying the downtown parking fee and securing off-site parking locations.
Commissioner Lisa Bennett said the city already has been through community meetings, and the project was well received at the time. She also said it “seems like it’s better” for the developer to not use the parking garage in downtown Winter Garden but rather the developer will have to pay a parking fee.
