Westview Abbey, the cemetery’s mausoleum and chapel.
Photos: Jonathan Phillips, Curbed Atlanta
Due west of the Georgia State Capitol, nestled along the south side of Interstate 20, Westview Cemetery might not have the cachet of its crosstown cousin Oakland Cemetery, which counts (etched) names such as Margaret Mitchell and Bobby Jones.
But this pristinely kept, 600-acre burial ground of winding roadways and towering trees is noteworthy for more than its sheer size (the largest cemetery in the Southeast, in fact). It’s the sort of place communities take pride in.
In honor of Westview’s valiant, runner-up efforts in this year’s Curbed Cup, we thought we’d venture out for this installment of the Visual Journeys series on a pristine winter day and photograph a place that locals consider a sacred attraction.
Westview Cemetery has been around for 134 years—an eternity in Atlanta—and claims some of the city’s best-known names, including Coca-Cola founder Asa Candler, Atlanta mayors William B. Hartsfield and I.N. Ragsdale, author Joel Chandler Harris, Civil Rights stalwart Donald L. Hollowell, and philanthropic giant Robert Woodruff, to name a few.
Have a look around these hilly, beautiful grounds:
Eubanks, Awtry, Candler, and Hartsfield are but a few of the famous names who’ve taken eternal residence at Westview Cemetery.
Photos: Jonathan Phillips, Curbed Atlanta
A familiar name around the city to be sure. Here lies Charles Howard Candler, son of Asa Candler, the founder of Coca-Cola.Just one example of highly detailed burial markers at Westview. Westview Cemetery opened in 1884 and holds more than 100,000 gravesite on its almost 600 acres. Some of the ornate, stained-glass windows at Westview Abbey, the cemetery’s mausoleum and chapel. (The panels, per the cemetery, depict the Life of Christ from the nativity through the crucifixion and resurrection.) Construction began in 1943 under the direction of the cemetery’s then-president, Asa Candler. A view of the abbey’s intricate stonework. Directly east, the Westin Peachtree Plaza and several other downtown skyscrapers can be seen above the graves at Westview Cemetery.Crypts and tombs dot the cemetery grounds. The Crenshaw family tombstone depicts an angel touching the stone. A lot of Atlanta’s pioneering families are buried at Westview.More graves dating to the late 1800s and early 1900s hold some of Atlanta’s best-known names.Despite its size, Westview Cemetery still counts hundreds of undeveloped acres.
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