Football season has handed Hotel Phoenix a new job. The glassy 19-story tower at 70 Centennial Olympic Park Drive, directly across from Mercedes-Benz Stadium, has started staging the Phoenix Tailgate Club on its third-floor amenity deck, turning what used to be the empty air above the Gulch into a pregame party with a view of the stadium roof.
The tailgates run ahead of Atlanta Falcons, Georgia Bulldogs and SEC Championship games at the stadium this season. Each one pairs chef-led grilling on Big Green Eggs with lawn games, cocktails from beverage director Thandi Walton, a live DJ and big-screen viewing. Tickets are $95 for anyone 13 and older and $45 for kids ages 5 to 12, and the price covers the food, two drinks and $15 off valet parking.
The second tower at Centennial Yards
Hotel Phoenix opened in December as the second finished high-rise at Centennial Yards, the $5 billion, 50-acre rebuild of the downtown Gulch. We followed it from the day it topped out and dropped the Anthem name through the moment it set its opening date. It sits beside The Mitchell, the project's first apartment tower, and next to an entertainment district that is still partly under construction. For the bigger picture, see our look inside Centennial Yards.
Construction started in late 2022. The finished building holds 292 guest rooms, 15 suites and a penthouse, and every room has 10-foot windows aimed at the stadiums and the skyline. Large LED signage panels are mounted across the glass exterior.
What's inside
Off the lobby, Zephyr serves a Southern-leaning brasserie menu, and its bar, Bar Z, opens straight onto the main floor. Urbanize's advice is to order the handmade cornbread with smoked bacon and Tabasco butter. The lobby lounge is built around the view: tall windows put the stadium's angled facade right behind the banquettes.
The third floor is where the hotel spreads out. A resort-style terrace lounge called Bless Your Heart, an outdoor pool and an event lawn called The Green all opened this summer, with sightlines running from the stadium to the Gold Dome and on to Midtown. A small Chef's Garden around the deck grows produce that ends up in the kitchen's dishes and the bar's drinks. The hotel also has about 15,000 square feet of event space, more than half of it a ballroom.
Art is part of the pitch, too. Curator Matthew Whitaker assembled more than 20 works by Atlanta and national artists, meant to tie the building to the city's history and culture.
If you're thinking about a room, rates this month start at $259 a night for one king bed. At the top end, two-bedroom stadium-view suite packages of roughly 975 square feet, with valet parking and a $75 credit at Zephyr, run north of $1,100 a night.
The hotel is part of the Centennial Olympic Park side of downtown, a short walk from State Farm Arena and the stadium.
Original reporting and photos by Josh Green for Urbanize Atlanta.
