Perched along the edge of the Atlanta BeltLine’s Westside Trail is a maze of color, construction, and art. The Bakery, a former industrial warehouse, is the newest hub for Atlanta’s DIY arts, music, and culture scene.
Housed in 22,000 sq ft, The Bakery boasts a conference room, spaces for artists to rent, a main stage, a smaller stage, a patio to enjoy the weather, and its very own coffee shop.
Founder Willow Goldstein, who signed a 3-year-lease on the place, said “the whole project was basically a giant gamble” because she wasn’t sure if it was something “Atlanta would be interested in.”
Still, she put everything on the line.
“At about the same time that I started realistically pursuing the building that would become The Bakery, my grandmother passed away. So there was some money from my family that I was able to ask for to kind of put down for collateral for getting the space and the loan,” Goldstein told “City Lights” host Lois Reitzes. “I also put my house as collateral and basically everything that me and my mother own.”