Tag Archives: hilltop

What will come next for ShopRite?

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Capitol Hill’s 15th Ave E is known for its sense of community and vibrant local businesses but one store owner is facing an uncertain future. Mohammad Abid knows his building is going to be torn down.

What will come next for ShopRite and Abid’s passion for his store and the community it serves?

CHS reported here on early plans for a five-story, mixed-use development that will replace the the 1904-built Moore Family building and the former QFC grocery store on the block.

“Yeah, maybe four or six months, after finishing the project down the street, they will start here,” Abid expects. “Same contractor, same owner, same everything,” as the work up the street where Capitol Hill developer Hunters Capital’s project replacing the old Hilltop Service Station is rising.

ShopRite means a lot to Abid who has run the shop for more than 20 of its nearly 30 years of business.

Coming to the United States from Pakistan in 1984, Abid says he moved to the US for an educational opportunity. After attending Edmonds Community College and working a few small jobs, he found ShopRite. “Before this, I was not married. Then I opened a store, I got married, I bought a house, I had children. I did all this to put my children through school and I have.”

ShopRite and the busy owner have been fixtures in the community. Neighbors know him, and he knows them, serving the same people for years, learning their needs, and ordering the obscure items requested.

But the city and the neighborhood needs more housing and waves of development continue to pass through the city — especially in areas like 15th Ave E on the edges of the most densely populated areas of Seattle. Abid has seen the neighborhood grow, and now the change has arrived for ShopRite. Continue reading →

Meliora brings ‘vibrant Pacific Northwest vibes with a touch of medieval influence’ to the old Canterbury space

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(Image: Meliora)

The Canterbury knight still stands sentry as the Capitol Hill public house at the corner of 15th and Mercer begins anew as “New American Restaurant” and cocktail bar Meliora.

“With a New American inspired menu centered on sustainability, and a highly curated, complementary wine program focused on Pacific Northwest wines, Meliora aims to captivate the senses and provide a delicious, welcoming experience,” the announcement for the new venture’s Tuesday grand opening reads.

Born of the dynamics around a history of raucous nightlife, the profit margins required to survive a Capitol Hill commercial lease, a 115-year-old apartment building, and Seattle’s never-quit real estate market, Meliora has transformed the former home of the Canterbury Ale House into a quieter but hopefully still lively use of the 5,000-square-foot space with “a spacious main dining area with original wood paneling sourced from a local barn paying homage to the rich history of the building which first housed a tavern in 1976.”

(Image: Meliora)

Continue reading →

Five-story mixed-use development planned for Capitol Hill block that QFC ditched and ShopRite and Rudy’s still call home

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QFC isn’t coming back to 15th Ave E anytime soon. The old grocery building and the rest of its 15th Ave E block are now being lined up for redevelopment some six years after Capitol Hill developer Hunters Capital’s $11.25 million deal to purchase the property, according to permit paperwork filed this week with the city.

The Seattle Daily Journal of Commerce is also reporting on the plans.

According to permits, Hunters Capital is planning a five-story mixed building with around 150 apartment units and underground parking for around 116 vehicles on the site running from the middle of the 400 block of 15th Ave E to E Republican. The plans include demolition of the 1904-built Moore Family building home to a Rudy’s Barbershop and longtime neighborhood convenience store ShopRite and the adjacent grocery and surface parking lot that hosted a grocery since 1944 until QFC exited the street in 2021 in a tiff with the Seattle City Council over COVID-19 hazard pay.

In a statement to CHS, a Hunters Capital representative confirmed the plans. Continue reading →

Design review: Tree preservation, parking, and new housing — A 13th Ave project with something for everyone on Capitol Hill

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A new project planned for the 600 block of 13th Ave E will continue the area’s transition away from most of its remaining single family-style housing. This week, the project takes its first bow in front of the East Design Review Board.

Under the project, three adjacent 120(ish)-year-old houses and a detached garage on 13th between E Mercer and E Roy will be torn down. In their place will rise a four-story, 50-foot tall building with about 36 apartments, a trade officials in the housing squeezed city say is necessary for Seattle to address ongoing affordability and homelessness crises.

The developer, Leschi Lakeside Property Management, working with Kirkland-based Milbrandt architects, are proposing the usual three options for how the building might be shaped. As this meeting is the early design guidance phase, most details are focused on the basic massing and layout of the planned development.

All three proposals call for parking access roughly in the middle of the building, and therefore, mid-block, which is less than ideal, but really the only option. All three are roughly rectangular in shape. There are plans to plant new trees along western edge of the property – the back of the building – to give the existing neighbors more privacy. Continue reading →

Developer to hold ‘neighborhood discussions’ as final design for Capitol Hill Safeway redevelopment is pounded out

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A rendering of the E John facade (Images: Weber Thompson)

A draft proposal for the February design review shows the current concept for the project (Images: Weber Thompson)

Developers of the project to redevelop the Capitol Hill Safeway with a new 50,000-square-foot grocery store, housing, and massive underground parking lot won’t face the final round of the city’s design review process until next month but they aren’t leaving anything to chance.

Developer Greystar and architect Weber Thompson will hold two “virtual neighborhood discussions” this week as they pound out the final proposal for the design to create two new five-story buildings including the new grocery, around 334 400 market rate apartment units, some new, smaller retail spaces, and an underground parking lot for about 350 cars.

“During the Virtual Open House, we will present materials related to our project and proposed neighborhood benefits and answer any questions you may have. We will also have a project survey on the website that you can fill out to communicate what is important to you,” Greystar says in the announcement: Continue reading →

Mixed-use development to replace Hilltop Service Station finally ready to break ground on Capitol Hill

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(Image: CHS)

After years of process, pandemic, and soil remediation, construction is ready to begin on the five-story, nearly 70-unit mixed-use apartment building with underground parking for 21 vehicles that will reshape the corner of Capitol Hill’s 15th and Mercer.

The old Hilltop Service Station is being readied for demolition. A representative from Capitol Hill developer Hunters Capital said the project to replace it is finally ready to break ground. Continue reading →

When it is finally reborn, Capitol Hill’s Coastal Kitchen will be a changed restaurant with plans for another 30 years on 15th Ave E

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In 1937, the building was home to Mrs. B’s Electric Bakery — Seattle Before and After

When Coastal Kitchen finally reopens after having been shuttered since its abrupt closure after a driver smashed his car through the entrance in May, much more will have changed than the front door at the nearly 30-year-old restaurant.

“The car was an opportunity,” restaurant spokesperson Robyn Nielsen tells CHS. “The car allowed us to stop, revalue, and see the potential of what we can do and plan for the next 10, 15, 20 years. I don’t think we could have continued with the same.”

The May crash followed on the heels of the pandemic in both revealing the challenges of business for the 15th Ave E restaurant and providing the opportunity to change.

“There will be no more diner-y vibes of the past,” Nielsen said.

Nielsen said a “rebrand” of the 1993-born restaurant will keep the name and the core spirit of fresh seafood but hone in on the strongest aspects of Coastal Kitchen’s future — an “elevated” dinner experience with weekend brunch on Saturdays and Sundays. Continue reading →

Residents of Capitol Hill’s La Quinta fought to have their building saved — Now they’re getting a new La Quinta building behind the old one

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(Image: Viva La Quinta/Jesse L. Young)

While residents at one historic Capitol Hill apartment building are calling for their building to be saved from market forces that will likely bring costly upgrades and higher rents, tenants at another “saved” landmark building are going to get new neighbors.

Early filings with the city this summer show plans for a new twin apartment building taking shape to join the landmark-protected La Quinta apartments at 17th and Denny.

According to the early paperwork, developer DEP Homes is preparing a plan to demolish a set of old houses that have served a range of capacities from duplex and up over the years to make way for a new apartment building on the land behind the Frederick Anhalt-designed La Quinta and its clay tile roof, its dozen two-story apartments, and its large central Mediterranean Revival courtyard. Continue reading →

No serious injuries reported as driver smashes into Coastal Kitchen — UPDATE

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(Image: CHS)

The driver was in custody and there were no serious injuries reported after his small sedan ripped into the front of Capitol Hill’s Coastal Kitchen Tuesday night, destroying the entrance to the restaurant.

Seattle Police and Seattle Fire were called to the 400 block of 15th Ave E scene just before 7:15 PM to a report the driver had either swerved or intentionally rammed into the mid-block restaurant. Continue reading →

Capitol Hill’s boutique consignment shops were some of its first small biz pandemic victims — Now, Creature ready to open on 15th Ave E

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Creature, coming soon to 15th Ave E (Image: CHS)

By Hannah Saunders

After meeting in Portland while working for a consignment shop six years ago, Cybele Phillips and Emily Schikora moved back to Seattle where they reconnected and began discussing the possibility of opening their own shop.

By last December, the pair laid out sturdy plans for a new Capitol Hill consignment shop — Creature — which will open its 15th Ave E doors to the public on June 1.

“We were ready to jump because we thought about it hypothetically for so long,” Schikora said.

Schikora and Phillips found the perfect space at 415 15th Ave E where Superb Cleaners had gone out of business during the pandemic and pounced at the opportunity.

“The space was kind of a blank canvas, which was really exciting,” said Phillips. “It was literally just a concrete box the first time we saw it, and there were so many possibilities in terms of what to do with the actual space.”

Phillips said the large space allowed Creature to expand into menswear and to create a fluid experience for movement, rather than having shoppers feeling confined to a men’s or women’s section.

Phillips said that the Capitol Hill neighborhood was where they wanted Creature to be. Phillips moved to Seattle from the east coast in 2001, was in Portland for a short time, then moved back to Seattle; during her time living in Seattle, she has been on Capitol Hill.

“I just thought the business would fit really well here, and I feel like this kind of shopping experience is really lacking in Capitol Hill right now, too,” said Phillips. Continue reading →