Centennial Park
2500 West End Ave., Midtown, Nashville, Tennessee
Like New York’s Central Park and San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park, the lush green landscape of Nashville’s Centennial Park provides welcome refuge from congestion, crowds, and bustling city life. The most notable, and possibly most out-of-place, feature of Centennial Park is its impressive Parthenon replica.
Nashville’s Centennial Park hosts all kinds of community events, including outdoor movie screenings, concerts, festivals, swing dancing nights, and Shakespeare performances. Active visitors enjoy outdoor activities, while families feed the ducks in the lake, grab a snow cone, and explore the Parthenon replica, which commemorates Nashville’s reputation as the “Athens of the South,” a nickname given to the city because of its many universities and flourishing arts scene.
Travelers can visit Centennial Park on a walking tour of Nashville, and hop-on hop-off buses stop here, among other Music City sights.
Custom tree signs with QR codes and web addresses allow visitors to view videos on their smartphones of Nashville musicians talking about the benefits of trees.
The Parthenon also serves as Nashville's art museum, with a permanent collection of 63 paintings by 19th- and 20th-century American artists.
Trolley tours usually include a stop at the park.
Centennial Park is near Vanderbilt University in the Midtown neighborhood of Nashville. It’s a 12-minute drive and a 20-minute bus ride (take bus No. 3 or 5) from the Ryman Auditorium. On foot, it’s a 20-minute walk from Vanderbilt to the Parthenon, which is situated in the middle of the park.
The park is open from dawn until 11pm daily. Parthenon architecture tours are offered each Saturday at 10am and Sunday at 2pm. The tour is included in the price of admission to the Parthenon, which is open Tuesday through Saturday, 9am to 4:30pm, and Sunday, 12:30pm to 4:30pm.
Located in downtown Nashville, Music Row is the heart of the city’s music industry business and the spot where modern-day label offices and historic recording studios, like the famous RCA Studio B, are found. Trolley tours of the city generally include stops at both Music Row and Centennial Park.
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