| Historic Name: |
Oregon Hotel |
Common Name: |
Oregon Apartments |
| Style: |
Commercial |
Neighborhood: |
Downtown Urban Center |
| Built By: |
|
Year Built: |
1902 |
| |
| Significance |
|
In the opinion of the survey, this property is located in a potential historic districe (National and/or local). |
|
|
This building was erected in 1902 and operated as the Oregon Hotel, one of several workingmen’s hotels in Belltown. In fact, on the next block to the south, was the Utah Hotel, currently the Apex Condominium (2225 1st Avenue). While the storefront has been renovated and a few of the openings corresponding to the first floor level on the Bell Street elevation were apparently modified, probably as a result of a 1988 remodel by John Graham Associates, the building has retained the most important elements of its original design. This includes the arched window openings and the simple but elegant detailing in brick, particularly on the main facade.
In 1988, the building was incorporated into the larger Graham and Associates project, which included the new apartment units for both the Oregon Hotel and for the historic building to the north of it, (which gained a modernized western façade). Since then, the historic façade of the northern building has also been replaced and there is no vestige of the original historic building to the north. Based on City records, few changes were made to the exterior of the Oregon Hotel building before this, although the storefront had been previously altered in 1933, with a restaurant added in one of the store front spaces. Records indicate that the cornice (or some portion of it) may also have been removed in 1957; however, the Graham drawings suggest that an existing parapet and cornice may well exist under the current makeshift parapet construction. The building has been known as part of the Oregon Apartments at least since 1988.
|
|
| |
| Appearance |
| This is a brick-clad building with a rectangular footprint of 60 feet x 111 feet. Located on the northwest corner of First Avenue and Bell Street, it is three stories in height with a basement level. It has a flat roof and parapet. Its structure includes wood stud walls, covered with a thick layer of brick veneer and regularly spaced interior wood columns. The main east facade is set along First Avenue, while a longer, secondary elevation faces south along Bell Street. There is a significant level change from east to west. This is expressed in the Bell Street elevation, where basement level openings are revealed and increase in height toward the west.
The main First Avenue façade is characterized at the ground level by a storefront, which includes clerestory windows, as well as an entrance on the north end of the façade. The storefront has clearly been reconstructed, but in a sympathetic manner; however, an original free standing cast-iron column, circular in plan and with a modified Tuscan capital, marks the south (east) corner of the storefront. The storefront level is topped by brick-clad wall, divided into five bays at two levels.
At the second level, each bay consists of two segmental arched openings, with an additional arched “eyebrow” in raised brick above each opening. Here windows are simple and double-hung. The sills below the second story windows consist of a projecting soldier course, with below that, well-spaced ornamental bricks. The third level has a similar arrangement of semi-circular arched openings, but the glazed top portion of each double-hung window is also semi-circular. The sill detailing is similar to that for the second story windows, while intersecting arches in ornamental brick surmount each pair of windows. Four courses of projecting brick tie the arches together, (above the springline of the arches).
Above this, the parapet is distinguished by a single, continuous, projecting brick course, which is surmounted by well-spaced corbels, which line up with the edge of each of the openings. Currently the cornice is covered by a makeshift enclosure. A drawing from 1988 indicates the as-built condition, which was a classical and slightly projecting cornice above the corbel band. It is likely that this cornice still exists below the makeshift construction, which currently tops the façade.
The Bell Street elevation is characterized by a slightly more irregular composition. The second and third floor levels exhibit regularly spaced arched window openings, similar in design and shape to those on the main façade. There are ten individual openings on each of these floors. What corresponds to the ground level on the main façade is raised up from the grade, because of the grade change. There is a combination of three segmental arched openings (similar to those corresponding to the second level) to the west and six square segmental openings, which are much wider than the standard openings seen on the main façade, for instance. The basement level has a variety of openings, including longer versions of the segmental arched openings, in addition to an expanse of more recent glass block infill.
The west elevation, which faces an alley also has a somewhat irregular composition, and includes semi-circular and segmental arched openings, similar to those on the main façade, as well as brick cladding. The façade is more or less divided into six bays, with two smaller paired arched openings at the third bay from the south. |
|
|
| Status: |
Yes - Inventory |
| Classication: |
Building |
District Status: |
INV |
| Cladding(s): |
Brick, Ceramic tile, Wood |
Foundation(s): |
Concrete - Poured |
| Roof Type(s): |
Flat with Parapet |
Roof Material(s): |
Asphalt/Composition |
| Building Type: |
Domestic - Hotel |
Plan: |
Rectangular |
| Structural System: |
Balloon Frame/Platform Frame |
No. of Stories: |
three |
| Unit Theme(s): |
Agriculture, Commerce, Community Planning/Development |
| Integrity |
|
Changes to Windows: |
Slight |
|
Changes to Original Cladding: |
Slight |
|
Changes to Plan: |
Intact |
|
Storefront: |
Moderate |
|
| Major Bibliographic References |
|
City of Seattle DCLU Microfilm Records.
|
|
Polk's Seattle Directories, 1890-1996.
|
|
Baist, William. Baist’s Real Estate Atlas of Surveys of Seattle, Wash. Philadelphia: W. G. Baist, 1905, 1908 and 1912.
1905, 1908 and 1912.
|
|
|
