IKEA Atlanta

Owner: IKEA
Location: Atlanta
Contractor: VCC
Architect: Greenberg Farrow, Atlanta

Designed by the team of Carl Meinhardt and Peter Drey + Co. of Atlanta, IKEA Atlanta is a 366,000-sq.-ft. home furnishings retail store incorporated into the new Atlantic Station development in Midtown Atlanta.

This two-floor store is the first IKEA store in the Southeast and the third-largest IKEA store in North America.

The design for IKEA Atlanta reflects the Swedish company's emphasis on style and function. The store's exterior is therefore relatively straightforward in appearance, while the inside features 52 room-setting displays and four complete model homes that provide a range of design ideas.

The store features 10 play areas for children, as well as the second-largest IKEA restaurant in North America.

IKEA's approach allows patrons to flow through a three-phase experience: a showroom of furniture, an area for accessories and a self-serve warehouse. Upon entering the store, shoppers move upstairs to the 63,700-sq.-ft. showroom on the upper level and embark on a tour of home settings that feature couches, entertainment centers, kitchens, desks and beds.

The upper level also features a cafeteria-style restaurant with seating for 340. Like the rest of the store, the restaurant's design features a streamlined look that incorporates simple-yet-stylish finishes.

On the 64,600-sq.-ft. lower level, shoppers will find smaller-scale home goods and accessories.

To keep costs down while properly addressing drainage issues, the design team used a siphonic drainage roofing system, which enables roof drainage to be accomplished by the flow of gravity without the need to rely on pumps. It was the first time that a drainage system of this type was used in the state of Georgia.

The store is situated on a 15-acre site - about 7 acres smaller than the 22 acres typically used for IKEA locations. To conserve space, the design team designed the store to sit on "stilts" suspended over a two-level, 1,500-space parking structure - thus creating the first IKEA store in the country to do so.

The design team then had to address the challenge of moving shoppers and their heavier purchases from the store to the parking levels below.

To do this, the architects incorporated "travelators," which are sloped, multilevel moving sidewalks that safely lock in shopping carts and transport them. The travelators used on this project were the first ones used in the state of Georgia.

To meet zoning requirements and Atlantic Station design guidelines, additional windows were designed into the exterior that are not typically provided in other IKEA stores. These larger windows allow a higher percentage of natural light into the store and provide more expansive views of the surrounding Midtown skyline.

Also, though IKEA typically places little emphasis on store exteriors, the Atlantic Station developers wanted the store to offer more of a street-level experience. To meet this goal, the design team broke up the store's façade by adding four sets of windows that are 20 ft. wide by 25 ft. tall.