The Fan is one of the easterly points of the city's West End section, and is bordered to the north by Broad Street and to the south by VA 195, although the Fan District Association considers the southern border to be the properties abutting the south side of Main Street.

[citation needed] Many cafes and locally owned restaurants are located here, as well as historic Monument Avenue, a boulevard formerly featuring statuary of the Civil War's Confederate president and generals.

[citation needed] While housing in the Eastern parts of the neighborhood are quintessential Victorian styles, such as Italianate and Queen Anne, housing stock further west was constructed in the first decades of the twentieth century and exhibits the pared back victorianism of Edwardian architecture.

As development increased from downtown at the turn of the 20th century, Franklin street became a fashionable "West End" address.

The term "the Fan" was coined in the mid 20th century by a Richmond Times Dispatch editorial, as the appellation "West End" no longer applied.