CNN Center’s rebirth as ‘The Center’ comes into focus. Take a look.
Nearly everyone in Atlanta has a memory of CNN Center.
Maybe it was ducking inside its food court on a sweltering summer day to enjoy some air conditioning. Perhaps it a school field trip to gawk at CNN’s studios. There also are the tens of thousands who worked there over the decades — not to mention the millions of CNN viewers who saw the brutalist compound as an Atlanta calling card.
But after CNN’s departure left its office towers empty and its retailers hanging on by a thread, its next chapter was unclear.
“This is a very emotional piece of real estate,” said Chris Eachus, founding partner at the property’s owner CP Group.
The property’s future is starting to come into focus as CP Group embraces its role as the epicenter of a fast-changing downtown Atlanta. By rebranding as “The Center,” the development team is trying to revive the complex into a bustling downtown hub.
The Center’s revamped food hall and atrium will open to the public June 12, just days before Atlanta hosts its first World Cup matches. CP Group also unveiled plans exclusively to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution to convert two of the complex’s office towers into new uses, specifically a hotel and an apartment building.
The new hotel would be a new hospitality concept separate and distinct from the attached Omni Atlanta Hotel at Centennial Park.
It’s a dramatic — and ambitious — plan to breathe new life into one Atlanta’s most high-profile complexes, which features several towers under glass and a common roof. Eachus estimated the entire project will cost $425 million, and nearly half that investment has already taken place to prepare the atrium’s food hall and The Center’s four entrances to debut.
Eachus said the scope of the redevelopment project is warranted because few properties in the city have more annual passersby than The Center.
“Everybody already comes here,” Eachus said. “We just have to offer them something they want to participate in.”
An oasis downtown
This isn’t the first time the building has undergone a name change.
It was originally the Omni Complex, developed 50 years ago by famed Atlanta real estate giant Tom Cousins. It contained the Omni Coliseum arena that formerly housed the Hawks and Flames, the Omni hotel, office space, a huge atrium and ice skating rink. The short-lived theme park, the World of Sid and Marty Krofft, famous for the 1960s children’s TV show ‘’H.R. Pufnstuf,” occupied a portion of the campus.
But the office space was largely empty until CNN opened its headquarters there in 1987.
CNN announced in January 2023 that it would move its Atlanta operations entirely to the 30-acre Turner Techwood campus in Midtown, the same place where Ted Turner founded the network. CNN Center had already slowly been hollowed out over the years as the network effectively moved its headquarters to New York.
Eachus said CNN Center’s public spaces often served as an oasis in the desert that was downtown, acting as one of the few spaces to gather around sporting events, concerts or conventions.
“In its prior form, it’s always served that purposed (as a gathering place),” he said. “But it wasn’t designed intentionally for that because it was a corporate headquarters.”
The Center aims to bake interconnectivity into its design, emphasizing meeting spaces, pop-up events and dining options that attract passersby rather than solely acting as a thoroughfare.
“We’re across the street from everyone,” said Ryan Howard, CP Group’s senior vice president over construction and development. “That connectivity will be seamless for all the visitors coming through.”
‘Make it feel approachable’
From the outside it doesn’t look like much has changed at the former CNN Center, especially compared to its high-profile neighbors that are reshaping the face of downtown Atlanta.
The $5 billion Centennial Yards project is rising out of sunken parking lots and rail yards known as the Gulch. The owners of South Downtown have beautified nearby streets and revitalized several century-old buildings, occupying them with restaurants and startups.
But The Center’s progress is shrouded behind construction tape, which is why the AJC toured the space to get a preview of what World Cup travelers and locals will see in a few months.
“We can’t change the whole building, so how do you embrace what’s there and the history but warm it up and make it feel approachable?” Howard said.
It’s more than just a fresh coat of paint.
The atrium is being rebuilt to support 11 food and beverage options that range from Italian and Latin eateries to chef-driven dining concepts, including one by Michelin-recognized chef Joey Ward.
Central to the atrium is what CP Group says is “the largest bar in Atlanta,” which will feature more than 60 seats. The entire atrium will be able to seat more than 500, and there will be additional events, pop-ups and retailers in place by the time the World Cup matches kick off in mid-June.
The Center has partnered with FIFA for a 30,000-square-foot exhibition, which takes up roughly one-third of the property’s ground-level floor. That section will be redeveloped in the future after the World Cup festivities.
In May, CP Group will also install a two-story “ATL” art piece through a partnership with the Savannah College of Art and Design. Howard said it will serve a similar function to the iconic red-and-white “CNN” sign that acted as the doorway to the property until its removal in 2023.
Some recognizable aspects of CNN Center will remain, such as remnants of the former show “Talkback Live,” art pieces made out of studio lights that were left behind and the building’s large globe structure. Eachus said the team is exploring whether it can be wrapped to look like a soccer ball for the World Cup.
But he said it’s equally important to inject new energy into the property.
“It’s important to preserve the heritage and the landmark status of the project, because CNN and Ted Turner are such icons in Atlanta,” Eachus said. “ … But we need to make it uniquely new too. It’s a delicate exercise, but I think we can do both.”
Converting unneeded offices
The biggest departure from CNN Center’s historic purpose is CP Group’s plan to massively shrink the property’s office footprint by converting two of the complex’s office towers into a hotel and apartments.
“You have to have imagination to stand here right now and look at this office space and picture residences,” Howard said. “But it’s doable and we have a plan to do it.”
Since the COVID-19 pandemic popularized hybrid work schedules and disrupted office leasing, the Atlanta area has grappled with a glut of unwanted workspace. Older and nondistinctive workplaces have especially struggled in comparison to newer buildings, and the Atlanta market ended last year with about 25% of its office space vacant.
CNN Center in its heyday had 2.2 million square feet of office space all occupied by its namesake media company. CP Group plans to shrink that to about 350,000 square feet. CP Group hired real estate services firm CBRE to handle office leasing.
The rest of the offices will be transformed into an extended stay-influenced hotel and apartments, the latter of which Eachus said will require incentives from the city of Atlanta to accomplish.
“Most of the buildings that surround this project are all public-private partnerships,” he said. “When you start looking at uses outside of retail that we’re designing, the economic gap is wide enough, especially on multifamily, that you need (public) participation.”
Public incentives will also allow some of the apartments to be reserved for tenants at below market-rent rates, but the specifics haven’t been determined. About 200 apartments are possible, Eachus said, and the hotel will also likely include about 200 rooms. CP Group will seek a hospitality partner because it doesn’t have an in-house hotel arm.
More information on the conversion timelines will be made available after the World Cup, which remains the deadline every downtown stakeholder and developer is rushing to meet.
“You don’t want to have an active construction zone when you have 500,000 people coming through,” Eachus said. “So we’ll stop, clean everything up, have a great party for a month and then we’ll go back to work.”
About the Author
Zachary Hansen, a Georgia native, covers economic development and commercial real estate for the AJC. He's been with the newspaper since 2018 and enjoys diving into complex stories that affect people's lives.
