Washington Park Building – 2024 Best Preservation Project Award
Historic Seattle’s Annual Preservation Celebration is coming up on September 19, 2024. We’ll celebrate the projects and people that help amplify our mission. Today, we feature the Washington Park Building in Pioneer Square, the 2024 Best Preservation Project Award recipient.
Congratulations Washington Park Building!
The preservation and adaptive reuse of the Washington Park Building transforms the late-19th century commercial building in the Pioneer Square Historic District into a vibrant, flexible office space with small scale neighborhood retail, food and beverage spaces, and a new rooftop penthouse. Initiated by the demolition of the adjacent elevated highway, which since 1953 stood a few inches from the building’s west facade, the project is helping to reconnect the historic neighborhood to Seattle’s newly revitalized downtown waterfront.
Located at the northeast corner of Alaskan Way S and S Washington Street (118 Alaskan Way S) the building now known as Washington Park was constructed in 1890 following the great fire of 1889 as the Lowman & Hanford Printing and Binding Building. Commissioned by business and civic leaders James Lowman (nephew of Henry Yesler) and Clarence Hanford, the unreinforced masonry walls and stout interior structure of cast iron and heavy timber were designed to handle the weight of the industrial printing presses once housed there.
When the Alaskan Way Viaduct (a two-level elevated highway) was constructed directly adjacent to the building in 1953, the historic front door was turned into a loading entrance, and visitors accessed the building interior from unassuming entries off South Washington Street. The building’s historic decorative cornice and associated parapet were removed following the 2001 Nisqually earthquake.
BuildingWork was commissioned by Unico and Lake Union Partners to re-imagine the Washington Park Building in 2019, as construction was underway for the removal of the Alaskan Way Viaduct and the creation of a new boulevard and pedestrian experience along the waterfront. The project goals included: reorientation of the building and program to re-establish its historic west-facing entry; full seismic retrofit of the unreinforced masonry building; restoration of original and still intact double-hung windows with new insulated glazing for thermal and acoustic performance; repointing and restoration of exterior brick facade; reconstruction of the historic parapet and cornice; newly painted wood storefronts and entries; and a new, compatibly scaled rooftop penthouse addition.
The renovation is a National Park Service Certified Rehabilitation, having met the demanding Secretary of the Interior’s Standards for Rehabilitation and Pioneer Square Preservation Board’s design guidelines.
The Washington Park Building is an excellent example of preservation and adaptive reuse that supports the continued revitalization of the Pioneer Square and waterfront district of Seattle for decades to come.
Congratulations to project team members: Unico, Lake Union Partners, BuildingWork, CPL, KPFF, WG Clark Construction Co., and A3Acoustics.
Image courtesy of BuildingWork