A Legacy Park for the Centennial Olympic Games
Atlanta, Georgia
Centennial Olympic Park is a 21-acre piece of the larger 200-acre Georgia World Congress Center campus on the west side of downtown Atlanta, owned by the state of Georgia. The Park opened in 1996 in conjunction with the Centennial Olympic Games hosted by the city, marking the 100th anniversary of the modern Olympics.
Behind The Original Design
The park's master plan was based on the overarching idea of a "Quilt of Leaves," underpinned by the American southern tradition of quilt making and the enduring and regenerating emergence of spring leaves each year. These ideas were combined to establish the layout for Centennial
Olympic Park.
The pattern driver is the surrounding street layout reconciling two urban Atlanta city street grids: one that is north/south and the other that is turned at a 45?? angle emanating from the Fairley Popular District. The quilt of leaves pattern has a series of outdoor courtyard rooms that represent quilt squares.
Rather than cloth, the park is stitched together with a rich palette of trees and southern plant species. Framing the north and east perimeter are a series of quilt square courts that wrap the large central Grand Lawn and Olympic Plaza-the latter of which features the Fountain of Rings.
The Impact
Centennial Olympic Park completely transformed the west side of downtown Atlanta. In the decades since the 1996 Games, the park became the catalyst that drove implementation of billions of dollars of destination attractions circling the park that includes the NCAA Football Hall of Fame, Georgia Aquarium, World of Coke, The Center for Civil and Human Rights, SkyView Ferris Wheel, and a number of residential towers, hotels, restaurants, and other attractions.
These new uses vied for an "address on the park," creating premium real estate value for them and tax revenue for the City of Atlanta. The park is owned by the State of Georgia and receives no funding for maintenance and operations that would be generated by the additional tax revenue that benefits the city. Instead, the park strives to be self-sufficient to generate funds via events.
It is a well-used and loved regional urban park. In fact, during the recent 2026 FIFA World Cup, the park hosted Fan Festival Atlanta. More than 500,000 guests attended Fan Fest events during the month-long international f??tbol tournament that welcomed the world to Atlanta before moving on to other host cities.
Fountains
Along with being the largest green space in downtown Atlanta, the park is woven together by hardscape paths, vegetation-framed lawn areas, and water features.
The primary water feature is the Fountain of Rings that sits at the center of the 100x100-meter plaza, a nod to the meter as the basic unit of measurement for the Olympics. The design of the Olympic Rings fountain is used with the approval of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in Lausanne, Switzerland. The mechanical system and pumps have been updated over its 30+ year history, moving from hydraulic mechanical controls to state-of-the-art digitally controlled pumps with lighting and sound so that water performances can be synchronized to music.
A large reflecting pool situated just north of the plaza has a cascade on the northern edge that spills down towards the grand lawn. Along the eastern boundary, a series of naturalistic water cascades flow over artificial rock, spilling and swirling into basins that head north as it slopes down the hill.
The Hardscape
Durable materials are critical for hardscape longevity in Atlanta's climate. The overarching pathway paving material is brick pavers, inscribed with names and family names of donors who contributed to help fund the park. Inscribed bricks are located by a system of numbered granite squares-each block is designated with a granite square with an etched number. From there, guests visually scan the group of bricks to
find their own.
Granite is used throughout in many ways, including pavers that show Olympic inscriptions and symbols from the 1996 Games and "rubbled" granite (coarse irregular block) columns that mark the entries.
The Memorials
Beyond the gateways, a series of memorials made with a variety of materials are
integrated into the park's courtyards that honor the people, moments, and values at the heart of the 1996 Games.
Granite is the featured material of many elements throughout, symbolizing stories associated with the history of the Olympic Games. These elements also include other materials such as stainless steel, inscribed with graphic symbols and narrative, and bronze that is used to cast sculptural elements such as Baron Pierre de Coubertin, the founder of the modern Olympics.
The granite used throughout is sourced primarily from Elberton, Georgia, and Coldspring Granite Quarry in Minnesota. The Elberton Quarry is used for rubbled walls and columns; Coldspring is the source for sculptural granite that is carved into dynamic, three-dimensional forms.
The Spectacular is an 11-foot-tall, 23.5-foot-wide 3D sculpture of the Olympic Mark, constructed of plate aluminum, and weighing 5,000 pounds. It designates a major gateway at the east portal at the former Andrew Young International Boulevard and Centennial Olympic Park Drive. It is installed on a raised granite and concrete pedestal, with linear LED uplights mounted in the paving.
The colors of the rings don't represent continents-they were chosen because every national flag contains at least one of these colors. The colors must remain in the same order and therefore both sides of the rings should not be viewable at the same time. Instead, the inner curves of the rings are painted a neutral light gray, featuring one of the five colors on the face of each overlapping ring. The middle ring is the only one with the same color, black, on both sides.
The Early Believer's Tribute is an ode to the people who supported William "Billy" Porter Payne's vision to bring the Olympic Games to Atlanta. Central to the memorial is a custom iconic precast concrete column with an embedded bronze plaque featuring a quote and listing the "Atlanta Nine" contributor names who helped secure the city's bid.
Adorning the top of the column is a 3D sculptural interpretation of the original "Five-As" star logo and Olympic Mark cast in bronze. Opposing the column is a matched pair of curved black granite-clad benches with the Early Believers' names and a quotation incised with gold metallic paint.
The Richard Jewell and Light of Peace memorials commemorate the 1996 bombing that tragically took the lives of two people and injured over one hundred others. The Richard Jewell Memorial sits in a fountain basin near the site of the blast; a gold star represents his vigilance in calling attention to the suspicious backpack that held the explosives. The Light of Peace sculpture opens to the north-the direction of the blast-and reveals a glowing acrylic crystal at its center, symbolizing hope filling the void.
The Emotional Legacy of Hardscape
Implementing the 2020 Vision projects required relocating hundreds of existing inscribed bricks to other parts of the park. Community groups who were monitoring enhancements proactively requested meetings with the design team to share their concerns about protecting the existing inscribed bricks, many of which bared names of family members who had passed away and are cherished as memorials to their loved ones.
To many of these families, their brick is sacred, and they were concerned it might be damaged or they would not be able to find their brick in the future. To honor this, the GWCCA and design team took great care to catalog, remove each brick by hand, store, and reinstall the inscribed bricks without incident.
Looking Toward the Future
Centennial Olympic Park will be featured during the ASLA Conference on Landscape Architecture in October 2028 at the Georgia World Congress Center. We hope you will join us!
As seen in LASN magazine, October 2026.
