(Our main story about the QFC opening, with a store tour and the ribbon-cutting ceremony, is here)
Just before the ribbon-cutting on Wednesday morning, that video shows a little side moment regarding the new West Seattle Junction QFC store and the building it’s in: You see QFC’s Kristin Maas acknowledging a woman showing off her “Ask Me About The New QFC” T-shirt. We thought she was one of the many employees gathered outside for the ribboncutting — until later, when she introduced herself via Facebook chat as nearby resident Adree-Rose, saying, “I’m the QFC T-shirt girl … just happy that all the construction is gonna be gone.” She had the T-shirt made about a month ago. A few minutes after her cameo during the ceremony, store manager Jeff Brown acknowledged the long-suffering neighbors in his remarks:
As for that “long time coming” — nobody knows that like Leon Capelouto, the longtime Junction entrepreneur who owns and developed the building for which the new QFC is the “anchor tenant.” He was acknowledged by QFC president Donna Giordano in her brief remarks at the ceremony:
Then he joined the crowd streaming into the store, pausing for a few words with her and others along the way (you’ll also see Adree-Rose “the T-shirt girl” in the video again):
We caught up with him just inside the store’s entrance, by the Starbucks kiosk. How does it feel to see the store – the building – finally open? “Unbelievably good,” he grinned.
We weren’t covering West Seattle news when this project began. The first serious mentions in WSB archives are from early 2007, just before demolition began at the site (which housed buildings including a Hollywood Video store – this item includes a demolition photo). Then there was a Design Review meeting in summer of 2007 (read it here, and see what you think about how it turned out, compared to the concerns voiced back then). As you see in that story, the project’s design was in part shaped by the fact that the once-planned monorail was going to whiz right by on Alaska. As for one of the concerns at that meeting, about an entrance on Alaska – here, photographed inside the store during our pre-opening preview tour, is the result:
As for the Office Depot that’s also supposed to be going into this building, Capelouto told us in our most recent sit-down interview that it’s still in the works (though the space does not appear to have progressed much); we have been leaving messages at company HQ for their perspective and have yet to receive a reply. The only other tenant Capelouto has announced is Desert Sun Tanning. Meantime, the Altamira Apartments over the store plan to start move-ins the first week of October, according to this tweet.
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