Cupcakes and ice cream have apparently sparked the Pike/Pine economy.
A new restaurant is ready to give it a try at the corner of 12th and Pike where others have repeatedly failed. ‘Coming soon’ signs went up today along with the ubiquitous brown butcher paper in the windows marking the start of work on Chow, a new bistro in the former home of the short-lived Pike’s Grill.
CHS paparazi style
Pike’s, you may recall, opened in July 2008 and was out of business by September still owing some $30,000 in rent according to the building’s owner at the time. Before Pike’s, 1200 Bistro filled the space until changing hands then going under in December 2007. The location sat empty until last summer when Pike’s bellied up to the bar. Now Chow takes a swing at making the location work.
I ran into Chow’s owners outside of their new project Wednesday afternoon. It will be the first collaboration for Brian and Tony — one ran a ‘successful’ restaurant in North Seattle before this, the other is an electrical engineer new to the business of food and drink. Neither wanted their picture taken (not hiding, they claimed, just weren’t dressed for the occasion) but they would say that Chow will be about Pacific rim cuisine and that they hope to open around the end of August.
The plan for the new restaurant also seems to indicate that an effort to rehab the building as a historical landmark (scroll way down in the story) might be on the backburner. We’ll look into that.
Meanwhile, a little farther down E. Pike, there were also signs of life in another dormant business space. A work crew was cleaning up inside the former home of the King Cobra at 916 E. Pike and, yes, it looked like more brown butcher paper was going up. King Cobra surrendered in February after its owners were unable to find a buyer for the nightclub ($425,000 on Craigslist!). The space was occupied at various times by nightclubs Sugar, Spintron, Velocity, Nine16, Ego, X-Factor and The Easy, according to this CHS comment thread. Give you one guess at what comes next.
When is someone going to refurbish the building at 11th and Pine? That building has been vacant for years and it is such a great spot. Who owns it?
Look Here… http://www.djc.com/news/re/12008386.html
i poked my head in there the other day, and it looks like the giant space has been split into 2, which isn’t a terrible idea since rent was crazy expensive for such a huge space.
The space was split in two legnthwise when it was Spintron…it was very nice because the dance floor and music where in a closed space allowing the rest of the club to be more condusive to conversation.