Hair Salon near Nexton, SC

For many Nexton residents, finding a quick meal often means choosing between convenience and nutrition. Julie Boone hopes her newest business proves they don't have to settle for either.

Blue Café + Wellness Market recently opened its doors at 424 Brighton Park Boulevard, bringing specialty coffee, protein-packed smoothies, fresh grain bowls, wraps, salads and a carefully curated wellness market to one of the area's fastest-growing communities.

But for Boone, Blue is about much more than serving healthy food; it's about creating a neighborhood gathering place.

"Healthy food should be convenient, delicious and something people genuinely look forward to eating," Boone said. "We want Blue to fit naturally into people's routines."

For Boone, opening in Nexton wasn't a business decision as much as it was a personal one.

She's called the community home for more than five years, raising her family in Brighton Park while watching the neighborhood continue to grow.

Along the way, she recognized a gap in the local dining scene—a place where families, professionals and fitness-minded residents could stop for breakfast, lunch or dinner without sacrificing quality ingredients.

"Opening Blue here felt incredibly personal," she said. "I saw a real opportunity for a neighborhood café that offered healthier, more substantial options beyond traditional coffee shop fare."

Blue occupies the space formerly home to The Bomb Bar, which Boone previously operated as a franchise. After years managing franchise businesses, she decided it was time to build something that reflected her own vision.

The name "Blue" takes its inspiration from the world's Blue Zones—regions known for having some of the longest-living, healthiest populations. While Boone isn't trying to recreate those communities, she wanted to borrow many of the same principles, whole foods and plant-forward meals. That philosophy shows up throughout the menu.

Customers can grab handcrafted smoothies, specialty coffee and breakfast in the morning before work, stop in for grain bowls and salads during lunch, or pick up prepared meals and healthier pantry staples on the way home.

Many menu items are naturally gluten-friendly or dairy-free, with an emphasis on whole-food ingredients and protein-rich options. Some early favorites are already emerging.

The grain bowls, each inspired by a different Blue Zone region around the world, have quickly become customer staples. Smoothies like the Build Plus, Blue Crush and Sunrise have also developed a loyal following.

Still, Boone said creating the menu wasn't nearly as simple as choosing ingredients.

"People see the finished product, but behind every smoothie, bowl or salad are countless rounds of testing, tweaking, nutritional analysis, sourcing ingredients and refining recipes," she said.

"It's an enormous amount of work,” said Boone, “but it's incredibly rewarding when guests come back and order those same items again."

Even renovating the café came with unexpected lessons.

Moving one refrigerated display case sparked a chain reaction of new countertops, electrical work and countless other improvements that weren't originally part of the plan. Like many small business owners, Boone quickly discovered that even modest renovations can snowball.

Thankfully, she hasn't had to do it alone.

As the mother of a 2-year-old overseeing three businesses, Boone credits much of Blue's success to her leadership team, including Director of Operations Natasha May and Café Director Haley Brooks, whose work helps maintain the welcoming atmosphere she envisioned from the start.

“I truly couldn't do this without an incredible leadership team," Boone said.

That sense of hospitality may ultimately be what separates Blue from other cafés. Boone hopes customers see familiar faces each visit and that they feel like they're dropping into a place that's part of the neighborhood.

Success, she said, won't simply be measured by sales.

"If people begin thinking of Blue as ‘their café’—the place they stop every morning, meet friends for lunch, grab dinner on a busy evening or recommend to neighbors—we'll know we've accomplished what we set out to do,” she said.

In a community that continues to welcome new residents almost daily, Blue Café + Wellness Market is aiming to become more than another place to grab coffee. Boone hopes it becomes one of those familiar neighborhood spots where healthy food, friendly faces and everyday routines naturally come together.

Despite an expectation of future growth, Nexton Parkway was built as a two-lane thoroughfare.

In 2026, with a bevy of new housing and commercial projects in Nexton coming online, a new school about to open, a hospital under construction and another having just submitted plans to the state, residents are left wondering: “Why was Nexton Parkway not built as four lanes to begin with?”

That very question was posed by multiple people to William Fishburne, director of commercial development for Brookfield Properties, during a recent Greater Summerville/Dorchester County Chamber of Commerce event.

Fishburne described Brookfield Properties as a master developer that “bought the land, and then we put in all the infrastructure, and then we sell land off to third parties.”

Reassuring residents that widening Nexton Parkway to four lanes is still planned, albeit about five years down the road, Fishburne passed the buck to local government.

“Berkeley County is our partner in this development agreement,” he said. “We put in that first two lanes on day one.

“Most developers would never have done that. I mean, we spent a ton of money before we made one sale, and we connected it end-to-end and provided a regional road.”

Fishburne noted that a staggering 75 percent of Nexton Parkway movement is through traffic, rather than traffic originating from within Nexton.

The county is betting on the passage of a bond referendum in 2028 for future funding. However, in the fiscal year 2027 budget that recently passed, the county earmarked $4.7 million for the design and permitting to widen Nexton Parkway. Construction would likely start in 2029 or 2030, said Fishburne.

“We’re actually working with them (Berkeley County) pretty directly on figuring out a way to go ahead and get the second two lanes designed and permitted in advance of that bond passing, so that when it does pass, the project can actually start,” Fishburne said. “We count the traffic, we sit down with the county and we talk about the plans. I would just say both of us are doing the best that we can, given the circumstances, to get the infrastructure in.”

In the near future, a left-turn lane and traffic light will be installed at the parkway’s intersection with Grand Boulevard. Sigma Drive’s intersection will get a traffic signal. Residents will have connections to U.S. 176 via Grand Boulevard, Midtown Avenue, Blueway Avenue and High Market Street. Developers also hope to widen the multi-use trail in select areas.

20-year development

Nexton broke ground in March 2013 after several years of planning during the Great Recession. The first home sale was in 2015. A 20-year buildout encompassing 5,000 acres is expected to conclude around 2032.

By that time, there will be an estimated $7.5 billion in cumulative economic impact projected from residential and commercial development, said Fishburne, who added that construction activity supports about 1,800 jobs annually.

At full buildout, Nexton will produce $2.6 billion in recurring annual economic impact, supporting nearly 15,000 permanent jobs, he said. The master plan calls for 7,500 for-sale homes and 3,000 rental homes. To date, about 4,100 homes have been sold.

“We have about 10 home builders that build homes in Nexton, and we try to have a very wide price range and style of those homes,” said Fishburne. “We want a variety of homes; we want a variety of businesses. If somebody came to us and was like, ‘We really want to try a new prototype,’ wonderful; please bring it here. We love that kind of thinking.”

According to previous reporting in The Post and Courier, the suburban mega-cluster of Nexton, Carnes Crossroads and Cane Bay is projected to house between 50,000 and 75,000 people over the next decade.

A population boost of that magnitude requires dining options, grocery stores, schools and healthcare services.

“Midtown is really our focus now,” said Fishburne, listing a daycare, orthodontist and Opie under construction. Opie, a drive-thru grocery store and café, marks the third grocery store in Nexton, following Harris Teeter in May 2024 and Publix in February 2025.

As more multi-family housing, restaurants and retail come to the area, those developments will surround the newly built Midtown Middle School, which will welcome students this fall. This is the second school within the community, after Nexton Elementary opened in 2015.

Opening in 2028, the 70-bed hospital MUSC Health Nexton Medical Center is part of a medical campus that includes a branch of the Hollings Cancer Center and an outpatient medical office building called Nexton Medical Pavilion that recently broke ground.

Novant Health submitted plans this summer for an 86-bed hospital on a sprawling medical campus near the interchange of Nexton Parkway and Interstate 26.

Fishburne gave an overview of the “Parkway District,” comprised of The Hub, One Nexton and Marketplace.

The Hub totals 90,000 square feet of mixed-use office, medical office and retail with 30,000 square feet remaining under construction.

Lot 50 is 25,000 square feet of office, retail and entertainment. The first phase is to open later this year or early 2027. It will include a restaurant, and Parlor Donuts has committed as a tenant.

One Nexton currently has a Publix and Nova One Nexton apartments opening in late 2027.

Marketplace has Harris Teeter, Chipotle, Chase Bank, Dog & Duck and additional in-line spaces under construction.

SL Shaw/Nexton Village will have 70,000 square feet of mixed-use office, medical office, hospitality and retail.

A resident asked Fishburne about constructing a better connection to the master-planned community Carnes Crossroads.

“There is the potential to have a connection right here to Carnes,” said Fishburne. “The one thing that would get a little bit complicated is, you know, traffic.”