It’s unanimous. The process to designate two Capitol Hill buildings with rich histories as official historical landmarks moved forward today when Seattle City Councilmember Tom Rasmussen — the lone councilmember to attend this morning’s session of the Council’s parks committee — approved additions to the city’s municipal code that will impose restrictions on the properties to preserve their historic characters.
The designations now move on to the full Council for the final step in a mutliple-year process to achieve landmark status.
Here are details of the newest official landmarks on Capitol Hill:
The 1904 building was slated to be torn down when a Capitol Hill resident named Paul Slane got involved and helped begin the historical landmark process slated to conclude with next week’s Council vote. Slane died in 2006 after successfully lobbying for the Cooper House to be designated by the city’s Landmark Preservation Board, the first major step for a property to become an official Seattle historical landmark. The building was sold in 2005 for $804,000 and the new owner attempted to transition the house to condos in 2008 but the economic slowdown nixed that effort. It’s now home to office space. Businesses listed at the address include Global Garden Preschool. The landmark nomination document attached this post provides a lot of interesting details about the building’s history and development at the turn of the 20th century on Capitol Hill.
Photo: Capitol Hill Housing- Pantages House, 803 E Denny Way
The historic home is now integrated into a low-income apartment complex and serves as 4-unit living space and commons for the development. The $10.9 million Capitol Hill Housing project was completed in 2005, a year after the Pantages House was added to the Landmark Board’s roster. The nomination document for Pantages House was not available on the city’s Department of Neighborhood’s landmarks site but this brief on the building provides some of the colorful history for the location.
Both properties will subject to restrictions on external changes to the structures when the Council finalizes the landmark vote. Ann Corbitt, a legislative aide in Councilmember Rasmussen’s office, said beyond the restrictions, the Council’s vote finalizing landmark status for the buildings is a good thing for the neighborhood. “For the community, it’s a nice symbolic thing and brings the value of the building to everybody’s attention.”
She also added that the Department of Planning & Development and the Department of Neighborhoods will be discussing the creation of new incentives for landowners to make landmark status more desireable. “In coming months, they will bring a new set of incentives that will go along with the designation” Corbitt said. “Some property owners are not that happy when their property gets involved in the process.”
Commend Tom for his interest and the choice of two richly deserving buildings.
Good work.
I do not support blanket over reaching and preserving every building on the Hill that goes back to pre WWII – in fact some of those rat traps, no code, fire hazards need to be torn down and the sites re cycled.
I had no idea how i missed this. I live in the neighborhood.
Now I live in this rock out apartment. Thanks for saving it.
Like the desighn and how they kept it as it were.