Ahead of you rises Ponce City Market, one of the largest adaptive reuse projects in the American South and the commercial anchor of the Atlanta BeltLine's eastside trail. The building was constructed in 1926 as a Sears, Roebuck and Company distribution center and retail store, serving as the catalog and retail hub for the entire Southeast. At its peak it was the largest building in the Southeast.
Sears vacated the building in 1987, and it sat through various partial uses — including as Atlanta City Hall East — before Jamestown Properties undertook a comprehensive renovation that opened in 2014 and 2015. The development preserved the massive 2.1-million-square-foot structure while filling it with a food hall, retail shops, office space, and residential apartments. The rooftop features an amusement park and miniature golf course with a spectacular view of the Atlanta skyline.
Ponce City Market sits directly on the BeltLine trail, and on a weekend afternoon the plaza between the building and the trail is full of cyclists, pedestrians, and people who represent the demographic mix Atlanta is becoming — younger, more urban, more diverse in ways that crosscut race and class. The building is a hinge between the city's industrial past and its adaptive future.