By Tracy Record
West Seattle Blog editor
One of the West Seattle Junction building owners interviewed for the just-released “What Makes the West Seattle Junction Special?” historical survey is about to start a new chapter of his own history.
Tom Henry, owner of houseware store J.F. Henry Cooking and Dining at 4445 California SW, confirms, “We have decided to retire and close our business.”
Henry (at right, in 2014 WSB photo) and wife Patty plan to retain ownership of the building; they have quietly had it listed for lease for a few months and expect to announce its new tenant soon. “We’re going to take off our retail hat and become landlords,” he told WSB today. “We’re too young to do nothing – we’re very busy people – it’s going to be kind of fun. I’ve told people, you don’t know what’s out there if you have to pretty much unlock a door [to open the store] every day.”
He says that while brick-and-mortar retailing has definitely changed with the advent of online, “our business has been fine, and we’ve seen a lot of growth with new people moving in.” It “just felt right for us to be doing something different.”
The store has been in operation for more than 31 years – “a little more than half my life,” Henry notes. During the time it’s been open, he and Patty have raised three sons, and he says it’s a deliberate choice not to sell the business nor even to expect any or all of their sons to take over the business. “I never felt like it was a business I was going to pass on to my kids.”
As explained in his interview for the West Seattle Junction Historical Survey, the J.F. in J.F. Henry is for his father and brother. “We didn’t name [any of their children] a J. or an F.” But “we raised every kid in the store – they grew up [there] – they know how to count change back … We did a good job in allowing them to do other things, not to have to take over Mom and Dad’s business.”
This is not to say they’ll be closing the door for the last time one day soon and not looking back at all. “We love retail and we love what we do and we’re really going to miss the people.” They’ll continue to live in this area. But they also didn’t want to just turn it over: “It was never our thought to try to sell the business and watch it either do well or not do well and change, and also be the landlord … we’d rather close one chapter of the building and let somebody else use it for another purpose.”
That building, as detailed in the Historical Survey Report, is considered to be one of the oldest still standing in The Junction business district, built in 1908. The survey deemed it a “Category B” building, which “may possibly have sufficient integrity and architectural and/or historical significance to be eligible for City of Seattle landmark designation.” From page 20 of the survey: “It has had numerous uses, including an undertaker, a residence, and the carpenters’ union hall. It has been altered several times over the decades but appears to have been restored to its earlier appearance.”
In his interview for the survey (6th one in this PDF), Tom Henry talked about that. The Henrys bought the building in 1996, after starting their business in the 4500 block of California in 1984; Tom had first spent about a decade in retailing, most of it with the now-defunct department store chain Frederick & Nelson. He told the survey interviewers that the 1908 date might have been for a “side building” because he has the original building permit and it says 1920. Whatever the date, after buying it, he fixed it up: “It was something we could afford back then. I looked at it as something I could afford and fix, and if you’re willing to work hard on it, you can create something. There is an appeal to taking something and making it better. However, not all old buildings have redeeming value. This one was marginal. I just took everything out that was added in the last 50-60 years and worked it over to look more like it did when it was built in 1920. … In record-breaking time (three months), my father-in-law Paul Smilanich and I and a contractor worked on refurbishing the building. We were able to demolish all interior walls, since they were non-bearing – over 50 tons of material! – We completely rehabbed it, including all mechanical and seismic upgrades. With the help of an architect, we made it look again like it did in the 1920s.”
Before buying the building, he had attended an auction of fixtures from his former employer Frederick & Nelson, and bought a railing and chandelier, both of which went into the store. In the historical-survey interview, he credits the “gorgeous, 100-year-old railing” for helping draw customers upstairs inside his two-story business.
However, he also told the survey interviewers, “The buildings don’t make The Junction special per se. We’re going through some really fast growth now, but I do I do believe it’s going to taper off, don’t you think because I’d hate to see the whole thing look like Bellevue. But if it happens, it happens. Everybody gets so hung up on the buildings themselves. It’s the neighborhood, the proximity of the residents and the neighborhood and the people, and those are the people who come and keep a business district alive.” The new people as well as the ones already here, he notes, in the interview. (As also noted in the interview, he and Patty are landlords of one other Junction building, the one that houses West 5.)
So watch for news of a “retirement sale” at JF Henry sometime very soon, and for our followup on the tenant-to-be who will write the next chapter of the history of what Tom Henry describes as his “nice brick building.”
| 20 COMMENTS