Feature
Perenn at Cheekwood is open, and a bigger Perenn bakery is taking shape on Martin Street
Tyler and Aubrey O'Laskey's bakery cafe opened inside Cheekwood's Frist Learning Center in May. A separate $1 million Perenn Bakery build-out in Wedgewood-Houston says the story is not finished.
Photo courtesy of Perenn (@perennbakery)
The best seat at Cheekwood this year might be at a cafe table. Perenn at Cheekwood opened May 1, 2026, inside the Frist Learning Center courtyard, in the building that once served as the Cheek family garage. It is an all-day bakery cafe in the middle of the gardens, and it has been busy since the doors opened.
What is served
Cheekwood's own cafe page lists the shape of it: pastries, cookies, handmade breads and croissants, breakfast sandwiches on sourdough made with house-milled flour, hearty salads, a garden club sandwich with rotisserie chicken, a leek and garlic grilled cheese, and a full espresso and tea menu. The cafe keeps garden hours, Tuesday through Sunday, with full menu service into the afternoon and grab-and-go items after. Members get a small discount, a detail that tells you how many regulars the cafe expects.
Who is behind it
Perenn belongs to Tyler and Aubrey O'Laskey, a husband-and-wife team who started the bakery in Reno, Nevada, in 2018 and moved their family to Tennessee in 2024. Their first Tennessee location opened in Franklin in 2025, with another in Berry Hill, and the name comes from perennial: the idea that good things return and grow stronger. The couple are Cheekwood members themselves, and their own account of the opening reads less like a business launch than like moving into a place they already loved.
And then, Martin Street
The Cheekwood cafe is not the end of the expansion. A $1 million renovation is building a larger Perenn Bakery coffee shop at 1220 Martin St in Wedgewood-Houston, combining two suites into one space, and press coverage of the Wedgewood Village retail wave has mentioned a Perenn grocery among the local names joining the neighborhood. No opening date for Martin Street has been announced; it is in the works, not yet open.
Why this one lands
Most cafe openings are a room and a menu. This one is a bakery with a point of view about place, landing inside the city's best-known garden, run by owners who treat returning as a philosophy. Cheekwood gives Perenn a setting no strip center can match, and Perenn gives Cheekwood a real cafe. It is open now, and it is worth the walk through the gardens to reach it.
Read more
- Cheekwood: the cafe page - hours, menu and the Frist Learning Center setting.
- Nashville Lifestyles: Perenn at Cheekwood to open May 2026
- Perenn Bakery (official site)
More in Belle Meade
- Sho Pizza BarOct 13, 2026Wood-fired neo-Neapolitan pizzeria. The East Nashville original holds a Michelin Bib Gourmand; a second location is in the works on White Bridge Pike.
- ItsalookbybrookeSep 21, 2026Hairstylist.
- Runout Record ShopAug 31, 2026Record store.
- Amed Home Solutions LLCAug 25, 2026Appliances repair and fix.
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