New Atlanta Opera complex was architect Allen Post’s dream job

Atlanta Opera’s recently announced plan for a $45-million complex on Woodward Way in Buckhead evokes many childhood memories for architect Allen Post.

Atlanta Opera’s newly announced $45-million building at the historic Bobby Jones Clubhouse on Woodward Way in Buckhead is big — and not just for the opera company. It’s also a dream coming true for the architect leading the project, Allen Post, who grew up on the same street as the classic clubhouse.

“Lots of childhood memories of playing in the park and the creek and later playing golf there,” said Post, a founding partner of Atlanta’s Post Loyal Architecture & Industrial Design. He’s been involved in a community plan to transform the local landmark on and off since 2017. “This project [with Atlanta Opera] means a lot to me,” he said. “And having that context of growing up in the neighborhood does help. I understand the feedback from the neighbors about wanting to preserve that building. So that’s always been our promise to the neighborhood.”

The Atlanta Memorial Park Conservancy and the Peachtree Battle Alliance drove the community plan of creating a recital hall at the clubhouse, naming it the Haynes Manor Recital Hall. The neighborhood was behind the idea, but as of 2023 nothing had been built.

Last year, the neighborhood’s preservation promise converged with Atlanta Opera’s search for a new rehearsal and administrative space, having outgrown its current location, which it rents in West End. The project will transform the 17,000-square-foot clubhouse into a 56,000+ square-foot complex on land leased from the state of Georgia.

“The goal was to connect with Atlanta,” said Tomer Zvulun, Atlanta Opera’s general manager and artistic director, about choosing the old clubhouse as the Opera’s new home base. “This is going to be the first performing arts company that is directly located on the BeltLine. So the connection to Atlanta is going to be obvious and terrific.”

While Atlanta Opera will still stage its main productions at the Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre, it will enjoy the bonus of the 200-seat recital hall (part of the original concept), plus brand-new administrative offices, rehearsal hall, costume shop and film studio. The total site area encompasses 4.7 acres of green space, the center and parking.

Michelle Winters, the Opera’s director of communications and public relations, says there is a known floodplain at the site. “We are building above the floodplain, but our proposed parking lot would have definitely been underwater [during the recent Hurricane Helene flooding.] It will likely be a no-parking zone the next time there’s a 100-year flood event predicted.”

The new recital hall will be managed by the Opera and will support performances and community engagement, including jazz concerts, recitals, cabarets, immersive chamber operas and potentially book readings and screenings. At the new location, Zvulun also hopes to incorporate some “biophilia,” that is, programming that leans into the connection between humans and nature.

“Because it’s in a park on a creek on the BeltLine, the opportunity for our artists, for our staff, for our audiences and patrons to enjoy the synergy between nature and the arts is going to be terrific,” said Zvulun. “Hundreds of thousands of people walk on the BeltLine every year. Now, instead of a deteriorating, decrepit building that was beautiful 100 years ago, they will see a hub and a wonderful center for music, for education and for the arts.”

Completed in 1941, the Bobby Jones Clubhouse is a Greek revival building that quickly became a hot spot for Atlantans as well as a symbol of Atlanta as the capital of the South. The golf course also became a Civil Rights symbol when, in 1951, Alfred “Tup” Holmes, a talented Black golfer, was denied entry. He brought a suit against the city of Atlanta that went to the United States Supreme Court and won. The court declared that all Atlanta’s public courses had to be desegregated.

Preserving that history is part of Post’s mission. The building’s classic facades and front and back will be preserved to look like they did back in their heyday. Meanwhile, a new contemporary-looking expansion to the east will house the Opera’s new headquarters, with a rehearsal space sunk and blended into the hillside below.

Once completed, it will become Buckhead’s first building dedicated solely to performing arts and civic and cultural engagement. 

The design process for the future complex will take about nine months. Construction will start a year from now, with completion estimated for summer 2027. That will cap a solid decade of restoration work at Post’s old golf hangout. After this expansion, he said he’s not planning on building any more at the facility. He feels like he kept his promise to his old stomping grounds.

“Being from Atlanta, being born on Woodward Way, this project means a lot to me,” said Post. “I have a lot of memories here. [Originally] we were thinking just of a chamber hall in the historic part of the building, and it’s evolved so much from there.”

CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story misstated that the Haynes Manor Recital Hall had already been built.

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Jeff Dingler is an Atlanta-based author and entertainer. A graduate of Skidmore College with an MFA in creative writing from Hollins University, he’s written for New York Magazine, The Washington Post, The New York Times, Tiny Love, Newsweek, WIRED, Salmagundi and Flash Fiction Magazine. Learn more at jeffdingler.org.