The Lake Forest City Council approved plans for a 47-acre subdivision at its April 18 meeting.
The Westleigh Farm Planned Preservation Subdivision will be located south of Route 60 and west of Ridge Road.
North Shore Builders of Winnetka received approval to build single-family houses on lots one-third of an acre and larger. About 20 acres will remain open space, said Cathy Czerniak, community development director.
As part of the approval, North Shore Builders agrees to market a house for sale at 210 South Ridge Road that was designed by architect Howard Van Doren Shaw in the early 1900s for Charles Garfield King. In 1916, a young F. Scott Fitzgerald visited his would-be girlfriend Ginevra King at the home.
“It made quite an impression on him as a young man,” said Laurie Stein, curator of the Lake Forest Lake Bluff Historical Society during an October 2015 talk. “It inspired the creation of several of his leading characters including Daisy Buchanan in ‘The Great Gatsby’.”
The house is not an official landmark either locally or nationally, Czerniak said.
North Shore Builders originally requested a one-year waiting period, but the Plan Commission and now the city council approved a two-year period after site preparations are completed. If the company doesn’t sell the house at 210 Ridge Road within that time frame, the developers can apply to the city for a demolition permit.
North Shore Builders aims to start site preparation once the weather improves and hopes to complete that portion of the project by the end of 2016, said Nate Wynsma, vice president at North Shore Builders, at a January Plan Commission meeting.
Home construction would take place over the following three years, Wynsma said.
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