Post navigation

Prev: (11/28/16) | Next: (11/29/16)

95 Slide throwing one last party Saturday bringing decades of nightlife at Harvard and Pike to close

Capitol Hill sports bar 95 Slide will never see the Mariners make it to the World Series. Born in 2012, the Slide never saw the Mariners even make the postseason.

It will close Saturday with one final party.

Owner Marcus Lalario tells us circumstances around the Harvard and Pike club have changed after he and the property’s developer owners reached an agreement for 95 Slide to leave the building a year before its lease was up. “I wanted to purchase the building, but I’m more than happy to leave,” Lalario tells CHS. “It’s just change.”

Lalario opened 95 Slide in 2012 and the sports bar outlived its early competition by years. Now, E Olive Way’s Kessler’s stands alone.

More a sports club than a sports bar, 95 Slide emphasized big events like UFC fight nights and borrowed elements like VIP areas and bottle service from the area’s dance club economy. The space was previously Lalario’s HG Lodge and before that the War Room. The game plan for 95 slide was born out of necessity as the club faced thousands of dollars of work required to meet Seattle Fire Department regulations despite the corner’s long and notorious history as a host for Capitol Hill nightlife and shenanigans. And now, it’s the old timers’ turn to tell you about Mr. PaddywacksUPDATE: This old comment thread about the corner has more names from the memory banks including Blu and the Brass Connection.

Pike Flats would be an awful name for a bar. It’s the plan for what comes next as developers Johnson Carr put together the money and resources to build a seven-story, 90-unit apartment building on the site. The developer plans to entirely demolish the pre-1940 building to make way for the new project and has purchased an extra story of height that went unused from the Melrose Market project, of all things, to do it. “Melrose Market paid for the ability to create an extra floor, they just didn’t,” a representative from neighborhood development watchdog the Pike/Pine Urban Neighborhood Council told CHS earlier this year. The design review board signed off on the plan this summer. The demolition paperwork has been filed but no permit has been issued. Yet.

The loss of 95 Slide won’t make Lalario any less busy. He has opened Ciudad in Georgetown this summer, Fat’s Chicken and Waffles has expanded to serve brunch and lunch, and he’s working on a fourth location for burger joint Li’l Woody’s.

The plan is to send out 95 Slide in a fitting ending with a Saturday “Fade to Black” party. What comes next at the corner? Besides the flat, the project is planned to have around 3,000 square feet of commercial space. Maybe nightlife at Harvard and Pike will make a comeback.

Subscribe and support CHS Contributors -- $1/$5/$10 per month

31 Comments
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
Stu
Stu
7 years ago

I know it’s common to complain about cool places being torn down to make way for apartments.

I’m fine with that. But nothing makes me sadder than a giant apartment complex with nothing at street level because they’re too overpriced to successfully run a business.

Give us more Kukai, Cherry Street, Fogon. Give us less of the emptiness at the bottom of Ava or Pike Motorworks,

fluffy
7 years ago
Reply to  Stu

Yeah, I was no fan of 95slide itself but I hate just how deserted that stretch of Pike feels. It’s getting a lot better, with plenty of businesses moving in, but both Ava and Pike Motorworks have been vacant both in terms of commercial *and* residential space. It reeks of hubris and vastly overvaluing the area in service of attracting upper-crust clientele who don’t actually want to live in places like that.

I have no idea what their commercial rents are like but I was curious about their residential rents and what they’re charging is more than what an entry-level Amazon employee can really afford comfortably, and anyone with more experience there (and/or a salary to match) probably wouldn’t be living in a place designed with the media stereotypes of millennial tech workers in mind.

Breaking Blonde
7 years ago
Reply to  fluffy

What’s amazing to me is right across the street or two from Pike Motorworks is the infamous “Harvard Market QFC” with literally dozens of homeless, druggies out, filthy meth and crack head bums …a few feet from this $3000 to $4,000(??) month building….so weird, sad, enraging and so on…

Donnie
Donnie
7 years ago
Reply to  Stu

Wow, to move into a 1 bedroom, 1 bathroom 629-707 sqft., is going to cost you $2,765 – $2918??!! Plus an admin fee of $300 (what is this for anyway?), an application fee of $45, and if you have a cat or a dog, a pet “fee of $300” along with a pet deposit fee of $250. This isn’t to mention a “dog or cat rent” of $30/mo on top of that. Are you nuts?!
So, in order to move in at minimum, you’re looking at $6455 just to get in if you have a pet. That’s not to mention any general apartment deposit. Wow, no thank you! Hey Pike Motorworks, way to jack up the rents in an areas which at one point was somewhat affordable.

Breaking Blonde
7 years ago

I was there election night, 2012, stood with Mike McGinn who showed up alone, no security….good memories…tx!

Whichever
Whichever
7 years ago

That place was craaaazzzzy on weekends in the summer. I always felt bad for the people that lived around it – could hear the noise from blocks away.

Ohbrother
Ohbrother
7 years ago
Reply to  Whichever

Don’t live in a nightlife area then and the scurry noise won’t bother them!

Buns
Buns
7 years ago
Reply to  Whichever

Ohbrother, do you actually read the things you write? Do you think people see your comment and think “well there’s an insightful guy!” Or do you just deliberately try to be a troll?

out for delivery
out for delivery
7 years ago
Reply to  Whichever

I live in the smaller apartment building next to it and honestly never hear the place, which surprises me.

95 can get rowdy but I’ve always had a nice time bullshitting with their patrons on the sidewalk outside.

I hope something at least half as cool moves in after.

Neighbor
Neighbor
7 years ago

Good riddance.

Adam
Adam
7 years ago
Reply to  Neighbor

Absolutely. Terrible place with terrible clientele. But I totally agree with the above comments – the emptiness of the retail space in the new buildings is frustrating.

Equally frustrating, national chains are the usually the only places able to pay for the build out. So we have to wait for a World of Beers or whatever moves in to go out of business before we can have something local.

michael wesner
7 years ago

i can remember when that was the Brass Connection. The restaurant at the Brass had the best damn food.

Hyper
Hyper
7 years ago

I couldn’t agree more regarding the two blocks at Ava and Pike Motorworks (and many other new buildings in CH). They have now been empty a very long time, and it has created a hole in Capitol Hill. The sad truth is the new commercial spaces are very expensive – both in rent and build out. They typically require $100K + just to get them up to code, and rent is near double what the older buildings ask. There aren’t a whole lot of small businesses that are able afford them. That’s why mostly you see chain stores, banks, Starbucks, your Ethan Stowell’s and Tom Douglass’s etc., (deep pockets) go into those spaces. It’s an institutional problem that the city planners probably didn’t even consider. For all the hot noise coming out of the City Council and Mayor’s Office, it’s the big developers that run Seattle, and when they’re done it will be a city of ordinary chain stores and crazy high residential prices. Seattle is just not as progressive as we would all like to think it is – the 1% are having a field day more here than anywhere else in the country.

Jonathan Konkol
Jonathan Konkol
7 years ago
Reply to  Hyper

There’s something of a domino effect here; we have a housing crisis because of the tech boom. You can’t build enough new buildings without knocking down old ones. The places with zoned capacity tend to be commercial corridors where lots of established businesses operate. The new spaces below all the new housing are really expensive and it will take a generation to depreciate to the level of all the old spaces, many of which were built out in the 1920s boom. What we need is a way of giving grants to subsidize small businesses and startups to smooth over the spiky market conditions. Unfortunately, Washington’s state constitution makes that way more difficult than places like Oregon or NY.

nettles
nettles
7 years ago

Is there a way to contact Ava and Pike Motorworks? Or the owner of where the Broadway Grill used to be? The emptiness is frustrating- can’t they divide up the space and sell smaller spaces so people can afford them (if they refuse to rent for cheaper in general.) Do they even care what the community thinks?

PAUL
PAUL
7 years ago
Reply to  nettles

I would think Broadway grill building owner is waiting to demolish the current 1-story shit-hole and build a 4-story shit-hole with $4000 a month rent!

Adam
Adam
7 years ago
Reply to  nettles

“Do they even care what the community thinks?”

No.

Chriscab
Chriscab
7 years ago

2014 World Cup US v Portugal was amazing there!! Sad to see this place go. Also, I used to work with the woman who owned Mr.Paddwacks and she has some real wild stories!!

Girl, Bye
Girl, Bye
7 years ago

*eye roll* so many comments on rent and commercial spaces and only one reference of good riddance. This place was a dump. I lived across from it up till a month ago, and at that time there were 3 nights of shootings at it, back to back. It’s no news to anyone that a lot of incidents around that area (ie the shootings in the QFC lot) were directly tied to people spilling out of that place. I dont care what goes in there, just get rid of the trash that’s threatening the neighborhood and its safety, and it’s not an empty condo.

DB McWeeberton
DB McWeeberton
7 years ago
Reply to  Girl, Bye

I live 1.5 blocks away, and what I won’t miss is the hours-long Sunday afternoon/evening rooftop DJ parties blasting music into my living room all summer long. Living in Capitol Hill, I expect and am okay with plenty of ambient noise, but that was REALLY egregious.

Also will be happy to have one *less* place bringing goons into the neighborhood on Friday & Saturday nights.

The Asian Hamburgler
The Asian Hamburgler
7 years ago

Fade to Black, more like Fade to Whack.

Natalie
Natalie
7 years ago

Great rooftop patio! Will be missed!

cd rez
cd rez
7 years ago

ughhh… bland losers complaining about the culture that brought them to the hill in the first place. you want quiet move to bellevue. lol @ blaming shootings on a place that people dance at. the hill is covered with drug dealers and gang members, it comes with the nightlife. alway has always will

Lojo
Lojo
7 years ago

I’m with nettles – why not divide up retail into sub-spaces that might be accessible to independent merchants? If we want indie business here, we have to make it even possible.

watch uk tv online abroad free on ipad

I have no picture but i’ve sound Sooner or later i
turned on the tv and sudenly a loud pop
came from the tv. It still activates and has sound but the display is black.

video one direction
7 years ago

If you would like to get a good deal from this post then you have to apply these strategies
to your won blog.

ska music ghost town
7 years ago

Greate post. Keep posting such kind of info on your page.
Im really impressed by it.
Hello there, You’ve done a fantastic job. I will definitely digg it and
in my opinion recommend to my friends. I’m sure they
will be benefited from this web site.

scie sabre
7 years ago

I seldom drop responses, but i did some searching and wound up here 95 Slide throwing one last
party Saturday bringing decades of nightlife at Harvard
and Pike to close | CHS Capitol Hill Seattle. And I actually do have a
couple of questions for you if you do not mind.
Is it just me or does it look like some of these remarks look like left by
brain dead folks? :-P And, if you are posting on additional sites, I would
like to follow everything new you have to post.
Could you make a list of every one of your community pages like
your linkedin profile, Facebook page or twitter feed?

Eric
Eric
7 years ago

The Brass as it was commonly referred too was my first gay bar. I had many a good time at that bar. There is an old saying. Straight to Neighbours, Straight to Brass, Straight to bed, straight up the A**. lol if those walls could talk.

Mike
Mike
6 years ago

Built in 1920 and the Harvard Tavern until 1935 and on and on until Mayor Murray and his merry developers demolished it and the rest of capital hill is on the way to looking like a development in China. Faceless and tasteless A-POD MENTS where the minions working for Amazon and other tech companies can crash after working 14 hours a day in this brave new world. Seattle has lost its soul piece by piece and its ironic that the first gay Mayor has led the parade of greedy developers.

presse agrume
6 years ago

May I simply just say what a comfort to find someone that truly knows what
they’re talking about on the web. You actually
understand how to bring a problem to light and make it important.
More people need to check this out and understand this side of the
story. I was surprised that you are not more popular because you certainly have the
gift.