Ponce City Market

The Ponce City Market project has transformed Georgia’s largest historic building into a vibrant mixed-use activity hub.

Site work included the construction of a new, elevated plaza tying the building back to North Avenue. Exterior work involved the restoration of the exterior masonry surfaces and the rehabilitation of over a thousand steel framed windows. Interior work included adaptation of the space to accommodate a dynamic mix of residential, retail, restaurants, offices, event spaces, and parking.

Between 1920-1930 Sears built 13 of these distribution centers around the country. They were each laid out with a consistent 20’ grid of concrete columns that supported stacked floors surrounded by thick masonry walls and large steel windows for natural lighting and ventilation. This same layout was repeated in the 1929, 1946, and 1966 additions to the original 1926 building. The result was a two million square foot vertical warehouse/distribution complex.

Initial work on the project began in 2004, and it became apparent that the existing buildings could be adapted for a wide variety of new uses. After studying several layout options, a breakthrough occurred with the realization that the regular grid could also work well for parking. Bringing cars to the upper floors of the 1966 warehouse wing allowed for the removal of the awkward 1966 parking decks that dominated the neighboring street frontages. This also added the potential for several new buildings to be built on the site.

In 2011, the project was restarted with new program goals that expanded the retail/restaurant component to over 350,000 sf and added a central Market Hall component. The office component was reused to include the entire wing along Ponce de Leon Avenue and a proposed hotel component became additional residential units. In 2015 Ponce City Market reopened, restoring its prominence as a vital Atlanta landmark.

Awards:
2016 AIA South Atlantic, Regional Design Award
2018 AIA Georgia Award of Excellence