Southern Spring Bed Company
Why it's listed
Four industrial buildings near Oakland Cemetery in downtown Atlanta once housed the Southern Spring Bed Company, a manufacturer founded in 1884. The centerpiece is a plain, two-story reinforced-concrete factory completed in 1920, with smooth concrete walls, steel casement windows and interior mushroom columns. Exposed half-columns on its south side show where later expansion was planned. A third floor was added in 1948. In 1935 the company added a heavy timber-and-steel building with brick walls, forming a U-shaped complex around a courtyard, and later acquired two brick buildings used for cotton and lint processing. The firm began with wooden spring beds, moved into metal beds in the 1920s, and by 1948 made automobile seats for a sizable share of the national market. It was among the largest bed and seat makers in the Southeast and operated at this site until 1977. After use by artists, developers rehabilitated the buildings in 1998 as apartments and commercial space.
Significance in brief: The complex is significant for industry as one of the largest bed and seat manufacturers in the Southeast and as one of Atlanta's earliest and longest-operating spring bed companies. It is also significant for architecture as an example of early to mid-20th-century factory construction built to be fireproof, including a 1920 reinforced-concrete main building with mushroom columns.
Machine-generated summary. This summary was generated by a language model from the official nomination document and has not been reviewed line by line by an editor. It may contain errors. Check the source document before relying on any detail. Source: nomination document (PDF) · National Archives catalog entry. NRHP reference 07000088, listed March 1, 2007. Summary generated October 2026 (model claude-sonnet-5-5, prompt v1.0-2026-10-29, confidence high).
Key facts
| Address | 300 Martin Luther King, Jr., Dr., Atlanta |
|---|---|
| County | Fulton County |
| Listed | March 1, 2007 |
| Reference number | 07000088 |
| Resource type | Building |
| Period of significance | 1920-1956 |
| Architectural style | Other: early 20th-century, fire-proof industrial construction |
| Criteria |
|
| Areas of significance | Architecture, Industry |
| Level of significance | Local |
| Status (as stated in the nomination) | Rehabilitated into loft apartments and commercial space known as the "Mattress Factory Lofts"; the company closed in 1977. |
| Acreage | 0.9 |
| Coordinates | 33.74919, -84.37574 (NPS GIS) |
What listing means for this property
For an income-producing building, listing (individually or as a contributing building in a district) is the gateway to the 20% federal rehabilitation tax credit on qualified rehabilitation costs, often stackable with state credits. Work claiming the credit must follow the Secretary of the Interior's Standards and be approved in advance.
Listing does not restrict a private owner acting without federal money or permits; where federal funding or licensing is involved, Section 106 review applies.
General information, not legal or tax advice. Rules change; confirm with your State Historic Preservation Office or a qualified adviser.
Sources and further reading
- National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places database (snapshot May 2026), reference 07000088.
- Nomination form (PDF, National Archives) — catalog entry
- Wikidata Q134322280
- This listing as JSON
Last updated October 2026. Found an error? See the editorial policy for how to report it.