(Image: CHS)
The latest business to move into Pike/Pike won’t be the one selling sex toys, it will be selling condos — 168 of them from a single new First Hill building to be exact.
The sales office for the soaring 24-story Luma condo building will be opening next month on E Pike near Broadway. The space had been occupied by Emerson Salon, which transitioned management and consolidated its space last year.
Marketing company Red Propeller is handling sales for Luma, which is under construction a third of a mile away at Boylston and Seneca. The new addition to Seattle’s skyline will open sometime next year without any commercial or retail space.
It wasn’t just happenstance that Luma’s sales office is opening near the heart of Pike/Pine. Red Propeller is hoping the office location will help the company reach Luma’s target buyers — creative, urban professionals
“What we’re really selling is a proximity and access to First Hill and the Pike/Pine neighborhood,” said Red Propeller’s Stephen Fina. “The sales office immersed in that experience.”
“Live every angle at the intersection of First Hill and the Pike/Pine,” one promotion for the project reads.
Artist rendering of the coming-soon Luna
The office will be open through summer 2016 when its 4 to 5 employees will move into an office in the completed Luma building, Fina said.
The land the Luma is being built on was purchased by Swedish pension fund adviser Alecta for $4 million in 2010. Another developer paid almost twice that in 2007 with plans for a high-end condo project but that venture got wiped out by the last recession. Before construction, a group of neighbors fought to no avail to scale back the Luma project.
Condo sales offices have been mostly absent around Capitol Hill since the housing market crash in 2007.
Luma developer Lowe Enterprises is one of the only companies to build new condos around Central Seattle and, really, through the entire city. Last year, Lowe vice president Suzi Morris said Luma’s location presented a prime opportunity for condo development in an otherwise tough financing environment.
Fina said he couldn’t speculate about the future of condo development around Capitol Hill, but he said interest in condo ownership is definitely on the rise in the neighborhood.
Well, at least it isn’t bar number 45,897.
Luma is the type of building that should be going up on Pike/Pine/Broadway.
I hope to see more condo development going up. Especially with multi bedrooms and a spread of price points to accommodate families and a variety of incomes (meaning for lower income folks).
Do cringe worthy marketing claims like ““Live every angle at the intersection of First Hill and the Pike/Pine,” actually work? Or do marketers think they do because they say it in a hot neighborhood and people buy the condos anyway.
They have to write SOMETHING, otherwise they don’t get paid. Though “incredibly convenient central location” would be more to the point.
there goes my lovely view of the baptist church steeple and june sunrises over glacier peak etc. nothing lasts.
Are you expecting to receive people’s sympathy trailrunnr, or are you being sarcastic? Really can’t understand people who move to the city and complain when a new building blocks their view of other buildings. It’s like moving to the forest and complains about a new tree growing.
Perhaps it was just a poetic moment of reflection
Maybe I did jump the gun, I’m just used to first hill, mirabella, and cosmopolitan tower residents trying to stop every new high rise proposal, because they think their view is so important.
I think it’s possible to personally regret neighborhood changes without expecting the world to stop for you.
As an 11-year resident of Capitol and First Hills, there are a lot of lost things in the landscape I miss, but I’m hopeful that increased building density (especially highrises like this one) will enable me to stay here another 11 years. Progress can be positive and negative at the same time.
Excited for this one. Will be looking into how crazy expensive they are and maybe buying :D
Live every angle and hear every siren… at the intersection of First Hill and Pike/Pine