(Rendering from design packet by LDG Architects)

That’s one of the design concepts in the final packet for Thursday night’s Southwest Design Review Board online meeting about the mixed-use building proposed for 7617 35th SW, between SW Holden and SW Ida. As reported here previously, this is a new plan for the site, where a smaller-scale plan went part of the way through the process four-plus years ago. This time the proposal is, as described on the city website and in the packet, for a building with six stories, 130+ apartments, ground-floor commercial spots, and ~50 offstreet-parking spaces. See the packet here; see information on attending the 5 pm online meeting and commenting here. Remember that this is the Early Design Guidance portion of the process, which means the review is primarily focused on the size and shape of the building as well as its placement on its site. (This meeting will be followed by the board’s separate 7 pm review of the Aegis Living proposal for 5252 California SW.)

Two project notes:

5252 CALIFORNIA SW DESIGN PACKET: One week from tonight, the Southwest Design Review Board meets online to look at two West Seattle projects. The second review, at 7 pm, is for the Aegis Living seniors’ complex proposed at 5252 California SW. We’ve been reporting on the plan since last July; now with a week to go until the meeting, the final design packet is available for review – more than 100 pages, twice the size of the draft version we linked previously, It includes the new “concept” rendering shown above, but its main purpose is to explore three “massing” (size and shape) options, since this is the Early Design Guidance part of the process. As previously mentioned, the proposal is for a five-story building – one floor higher than the basic zoning because they’re proposing Living Building Challenge elements – with up to 100 units (70 assisted living, 30 memory care). Public comment is part of the 7 pm Thursday, February 2nd, meeting; attendance/commenting info is here.

1318 ALKI COMMENTS: From today’s Land Use Information Bulletin, a Shoreline Substantial Development application has been submitted for a proposal to build two buildings with six townhouses and nine offstreet-parking spaces at 1318 Alki SW. Comments will be accepted through February 24th; this notice explains how to offer yours.

(Preferred ‘massing’ – size and shape – for project, from draft design packet)

As first reported here last July, Aegis Living is proposing a new assisted-living/memory-care complex at the long-vacant strip mall/restaurant site on the northeast side of California/Brandon, formally using the address 5252 California SW. Last month, the six-story, 100+-unit project was set for a mid-January date before the Southwest Design Review Board, but now that’s changed – it’s set for the second half of an online doubleheader, 7 pm Thursday, February 2nd. (The first half of the meeting – at 5 pm – will focus on the 7617 35th SW mixed-use project.) Meeting participation info, including how to comment, is here; the official meeting notice (to be published by the city Tuesday) is here; a draft version of the design packet is here. The first meeting is for “early design guidance,” so it will focus on the project’s size, shape, and placement on the site.

It’s been more than four years since a mixed-use project on 35th SW between Holden and Ida was last seen by the Southwest Design Review Board, which ordered the project team to come back for a second round of Early Design Guidance. (Remember that Early Design Guidance is largely about size and shape of the building – “massing”; the project team’s preferred option is above.) Two years later, we reported the plan had expanded. Now, two years after that, the project is scheduled to return to the board – and it’s been expanded again. Back in 2018, a four-story building with about 50 apartments was proposed; in 2020, it was a five-story plan with 120 apartments; now it’s six stories and more than 130 apartments, with ground-floor commercial space and 50 underground parking stalls. You can see the draft design packet here. The revised project is scheduled to go before the SWDRB at 5 pm Thursday, February 2nd, online; watch for the meeting link here.

(Preferred ‘massing’ – size and shape – for project, from draft design packet)

With far fewer major projects in the pipeline these days, the Southwest Design Review Board‘s meetings are few and far between – just three this year. The first meeting for next year has just been scheduled. The board will get an “early design guidance” look at what will be Aegis Living‘s second West Seattle senior-living complex on January 19th. We first told you in July about this new plan for the long-vacant, often-vandalized ex-strip-mall and ex-restaurant properties in the 5200 block of California SW, formerly proposed for townhouses. The project will go to the board with the address 5252 California SW. The project file includes this description given to people living near the site during a September-October outreach period:

A six-story*, 100 sft building, offering 100+ assisted living and memory care apartments.

The ground level will include a variety of amenities and gathering spaces for residents and visitors such as a grand living room, activity room, dining, a movie theater, retail and more.

The second floor will include 45+ parking spaces for visitors and staff.

Floors 3-6 will include residential apartments for assisted living and memory care. The sixth floor will also host a sky lounge for residents to enjoy.

This West Seattle community will be built to meet the rigorous standards of the Living Building Challenge Petal Certification through the International Living Future Institute (ILFI). The Living Building Challenge defines itself as the world’s most ambitious and advanced performance standard for green, resilient, and healthy buildings.

*A sixth level will be granted as part of participation in the Living Building Challenge and meeting the sustainable design criteria set forth.

Aegis says it’s already developed one project to Living Building Challenge standards, in Lake Union. (In West Seattle, the PCC Community Markets [WSB sponsor] rebuild was also an LBC project.) Also, when we last asked Aegis about the plan, we were told that “existing street trees would be preserved.” You can see the draft design packet here – remember that the “early design guidance” phase focuses on the size and shape of the building, so this (and the image atop this story) is not the fully detailed proposal. Find out more at the 5 pm meeting on Thursday, January 19th, which will be online (watch this page for the link).

JANUARY 1 UPDATE: The meeting’s been moved to 7 pm February 2nd.

Back in April, we reported an early-stage filing for 30 townhouses on the site of a building and parking lot long owned by West Seattle Christian Church. Its pastor told us at the time that it was part of a feasibility exploration for a potential sale. New documents in online city permit files indicate the project is proceeding, and the site plan now shows 31 townhouses proposed for the site. The official project address is 4425 41st SW; the developer is listed in city files as Jabooda Homes (whose website also shows the plan), working with Cone Architecture.

Two (re)development notes:

(WSB photo, 4515 44th SW)

4515 44TH SW: It’s been two and a half years since we first reported on a proposal for the former CDE Software site in The Junction at 4515 44th SW. Now the plan for more than 40 microapartments with no offstreet motor-vehicle parking has received land-use approval. That opens an appeal period; if you want to file one, you can do so through October 31st, as explained in this notice.

1790 ALKI SW: City files show an early-stage proposal for a “4-story apartment building” – no number of units mentioned – on parcels at 1790 and 1794 Alki [map], both holding houses that a commenter described as “vacant” three years ago. No visuals on file yet but the architect Kun Lim‘s website shows schematics/concepts for the project.

(King County Assessor photo, 6355 41st SW)

Just east of the ex-substation/future EV-charging station in Morgan Junction, a parcel’s recently been redeveloped into townhomes. Now the adjacent parcel to the north of that one has a similar plan. The comment period has just opened for the city’s Streamlined Design Review process regarding the project, which has an official address of 6355 41st SW – currently holding that 118-year-old house shown above – but has its longest side along Fauntleroy Way SW. It’s proposed for six 3-story townhouses with five offstreet vehicle-parking spaces, to be accessed from the alley on the parcel’s west side, plus eight bicycle-parking spaces. It’s in Early Design Guidance stage (here’s the draft design packet), so if you have comments, you have until October 19th to send them; the official notice explains how.

Three development notes tonight:

TOWER CRANE: For the first time in more than 14 months, West Seattle has a tower crane. The last one to come down was for the 1250 Alki SW Infinity Shore Club (WSB sponsor) condo project; as of this week, this one is up for the 4508 California 7-story mixed-use project. Work at the site has been under way for almost three months.

DESIGN REVIEW: A little more than one block west, the 4515 44th SW project is going into the next phase of Design Review, though without a public meeting, as it’s going through Administrative DR. It’s a four-story building with 43 microapartments and no offstreet parking. The design packet is linked from this city webpage; you can comment to the city’s assigned planner at theresa.neyton@seattle.gov.

AEGIS LIVING PROJECT: We reported last month that Aegis Living is buying and planning to develop the long-idle, much-vandalized 5242-5258 California SW site. Now it’s appeared in the city’s Early Outreach for Design Review pipeline, with a few more details via this description:

Construction of a 95-100 unit, five level Assisted Living Community. In-building parking for 40-50 cars. Project will pursue living building challenge environmental certification.

Aegis already has a location in West Seattle, at 4700 SW Admiral Way. The new site holds a former strip mall/office bulding and two former restaurants.

(Rendering by Atelier Drome)

Without many big projects in the pipeline, meetings of the Southwest Design Review Board – which could meet up to twice a month, with up to two projects on each agenda – have been few and far between. In an online meeting Thursday night, the all-volunteer board took its third look at 4448 California SW, the mixed-use project set to replace the commercial building that currently holds Doll Parts Collective and a new temporary location of West Seattle Coworking. The 7-story building is proposed for 96 apartments – described by the project team as “a mix of 1-bedroom, 2-bedroom, and 3-bedroom” units – and ground-floor commercial, with no offstreet-parking spaces.

The board has had some changes since its second look at the project in November; Patrick Cobb is now the chair, and two of the other three members in attendance were new – Brenda Baxter and Gavin Schaefer. Of the two continuing members, Alan Grainger was present and Johanna Lirman was absent. The city planner assigned to the project also has changed since the November review; now it’s David Sachs.

Here’s the design packet used for the meeting. There were no major remaining points of concern, and the only public comment that came in during the meeting was positive. It was noted that some written comments had been received pre-meeting about aspects outside the SWDRB’s jurisdiction – including parking and density. Board members observed that the architects from Atelier Drome had revised the design in accordance with guidance given by the board in November. They spelled out five points they want to see addressed before the final design gets official city approval. Those include differentiating the residential entry from the commercial entry and signage; they were concerned the commercial signage would get lost under the awning, and pointed to signage on the edge of the awning at the nearby AJ Apartments as an example of how that problem could be avoided. Another focus area is the bicycle-storage room access, ensuring lighting and security.

WHAT’S NEXT: If you have comments about the project – design or otherwise – you still have time to email Sachs (david.sachs@seattle.gov). He’ll write the final report on the project, and it still has other phases of the permit process to go through before construction can begin.

(2021 WSB photo of part of the site, which also includes 2 ex-restaurants to the south)

4:26 PM: The long-dormant, frequently vandalized development site in the 5200 block of California SW – two former restaurants and a former strip mall – has a new plan, according to what we just found in online city files: An assisted-living complex. An early-stage site plan filed with the city Tuesday shows the proposal is from Aegis Living, which already has one West Seattle assisted-living/memory-care complex, in west Admiral. We reported one year ago that the site was back on the market, after a plan to redevelop it as townhouses stalled, and the listing has had the notation “(sale) pending” for some time; King County Assessor records do not yet show a completed sale. The site is zoned for four-sstory mixed-use development (NC2-40). We’re contacting Aegis to find out more about their plan, which the city website summarizes simply as “new assisted living and life neighborhood building.”

7:17 PM: We’ve heard back from an Aegis spokesperson who says there’s not a lot to say as this is so early-stage but promises some information tomorrow.

THURSDAY MORNING UPDATE: In response to our inquiry, we’ve received this statement from Walter Braun, Aegis Living’s Chief Development Officer:

Aegis Living is in the early stages of a potential second development in West Seattle. Our team has loved being a part of West Seattle and hope to bring another Aegis Living assisted living and memory care community to the area. It is too early to share details, but we can confirm we have signed a purchase and sales agreement to explore this development. We are excited about the potential project, and as we continue in our due diligence, are hopeful we can share more details soon.

This isn’t particularly controversial, but if you pay attention to public process, it’s notable: A City Council vote tomorrow is expected to pave the way for the end of a five-year process involving a West Seattle street vacation. That’s the term for a publicly owned right-of-way – whether developed as a street or not – being given up by the public entity that owns it. In this case, both the West Coast Self-Storage facility that opened more than a year ago on Harbor Avenue SW and nearby Nucor are getting something out of the transfer of three-fifths of an acre of land that technically have been undeveloped parts of 29th SW and SW City View. We wrote extensively about the plan back in 2017, when councilmembers approved it. The self-storage company offered a package of “public benefits” estimated to be worth more than $300,000 (originally detailed in 2017), including metal art panels like these two and various pedestrian/bike-trail improvements:

Last Tuesday, the council’s Transportation and Utilities Committee got a presentation how it had all turned out. You can see it about 30 minutes into the meeting recording:

(Added: The slide deck from that meeting is here.) The purpose of this final part of the process is to confirm that the beneficiary of the street vacation has completed their obligation, The committee members who were present signaled their approval with “yes” votes. Tomorrow, the full council has to take one last vote. After that, there’ll be one last step to finalizing the turnover – the property will officially be transferred to WC Self-Storage, which has already paid the city more than a million dollars for it. If you’re wondering about Nucor’s role in all this – it involves part of the railroad tracks.

What could be the next West Seattle Junction redevelopment project to start construction needs one more level of approval from the Southwest Design Review Board, and a date is now set for their next look at it. The proposal would replace a small commercial building at 4448 California SW [map] with a seven-story mixed-use building, including almost 100 apartments as well as ground-floor commercial space, with no offstreet parking required or planned. The project cleared the first phase of Design Review last year (here’s our coverage from November), and is penciled in to return to the board at 5 pm Thursday, August 4th, online. Here’s the draft design packet with details on the plan. The August review will include a public-comment period, but if you have something to say, you can also email the project’s assigned city planner, at david.sachs@seattle.gov.

If you were in The Junction for the West Seattle Farmers’ Market, and/or other business, today, you might have noticed that after a week, the demolition is done at the 4508 California SW mixed-use project site (we reported on its start this past Tuesday). Also as of a few days ago, part of the parking lot east of the alley is fenced off:

On the California side of the site, the sidewalk remains open, as stipulated in the construction-management plan, with scaffolding and plywood currently hiding the work. The alley is open too but subject to intermittent closures. Re-reading the plan today, we also note a slightly different description of the 7-story project – 38 apartments, 20 Small Efficiency Dwelling Units (microapartments), 12 lodging units, 3,500 square feet of commercial space, and 14 offstreet-parking spaces, all but 1 underground. The plan says construction is expected to last just under a year and a half.

This morning we described the 4508 California SW mixed-use project site as “about-to-start-demolition.” We had gone by at 9 am, looking at both sides of the site, and noting no heavy equipment in sight, so it didn’t seem like the teardown would start today. However, when we checked back tonight, we discovered demolition has indeed begun, from the alley, at the back of the former Kamei Japanese Restaurant.

(The building being demolished for redevelopment also was home to Lee’s Asian Restaurant and Naked Crepe.) No hint of the demolition from the front yet – just plywood and scaffolding. The project is planned as 7 stories, 58 residential units, 12 lodging units, 3,500+ square feet of commercial space, and 17 offstreet-parking spaces. Its owner/developer is longtime Junction entrepreneur Leon Capelouto, who also built two mixed-use buildings close to this site, the AJ at 42nd/Oregon and Altamira/Capco Plaza at 42nd/Alaska. We don’t have a recent timeline estimate but mixed-use projects of this scale usually take a year to a year and a half to build.