Homebuilder John Wieland created a contemporary art museum as a gift to Atlanta—and it’s free

Photograph courtesy of the Wilbert Group

The 30,000 homes John Wieland has built in neighborhoods all over Atlanta will always be his legacy to the city, but now he has something more personal for us all. Wieland’s private collection of art is now on display at his art museum, the Warehouse , which opened to the public on April 13. The facility, located at 1643 Chattahoochee Avenue Northwest, will continue with monthly open houses—free with an advance reservation—on the second Saturday of every month from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. As a relevant theme to the museum, all 400 pieces of art relate to the concept of house and home.

Wieland grew up interested in art, partially inspired by his hometown Cleveland’s impressive art museum. Around the 1980s, when he and his late wife Sue were living in Atlanta and started collecting art, Wieland said to himself, “Why am I struggling with what to collect? I build homes.” The idea of home as a refuge, an escape, and a reflection of our society is a big motif, so his collection is also ambitious, with paintings, sculpture, videos, fiber art, and ceramics that reflect the cozy side of home life, but also broader social issues. Everyone should have a home, Wieland believes, a reason he is heavily involved with Habitat for Humanity.

Photograph by Mike Jensen/The Warehouse

The 39,000-square-foot facility houses works of art from all over the world, including pieces by such notable artists as Roy Lichtenstein, Radcliffe Bailey, and Howard Finster. Rooms in the museum are divided by themes that relate to home, such as makeshift houses or subdivisions. Large-scale installations are striking, and 3-D pieces intriguing to walk around, but some of the compilations of multiple images are equally thought-provoking. A series of New York Times -commissioned photos by Gregory Crewdson, for instance, have a cinematic approach: he invited well-known actors such as Julianne Moore, Philip Seymour Hoffman, and William H. Macy to pose at the same modest ranch house, but with each photo portraying a dramatic tale.

Wieland bought the property in Atlanta’s Westside in 2010, converting a former furniture store into a storage facility. Its renovations in 2023 made it a full-fledged museum, with offices, a video theater, and lounge areas. Philip Verre, formerly chief operating officer for the High Museum of Art, is the director at the Warehouse, with John Wieland’s son Jack serving as curator.

Photograph by Mike Jensen/The Warehouse

Photograph by Mike Jensen

Courtesy of Howard Greenberg Gallery, New York.

As for John Wieland’s role in Atlanta neighborhoods, he might be most well-known for welcoming subdivisions, with brick family homes dotted around cul-de-sacs and neighborhood pools. In recent years, however, his firm JW Collection Homes has focused on higher-density communities— such as One Museum Place , across from the High Museum—that are walkable places to live near city centers.

Is Wieland himself an artist? “No, my form of art is architecture,” he says. “But we aspire to be part of the Atlanta arts ecosystem with this museum.”

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