Shop the Hill? Add a stop at 11th and Pike where the city is making it safer to cross and Retrofit Home is open for business

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Retrofit shared this image from 11th and Pike

If you appreciate the work underway this December to make it safer to cross the street in Pike/Pine you also might want to make sure to do a little holiday shopping in the area.

Local merchants including longtime retailer Retrofit Home got an unpleasant start to the holiday shopping season this week as Seattle Department of Transportation crews arrived to start sawing concrete and pouring new safety features around the intersection of 11th and Pike. The work zone includes closing off several street parking spots — some of the few remaining in Pike/Pine’s wild mix of paid street parking, food delivery pickup zones, and loading areas for the neighborhood’s live music and performance venues.

Retrofit says they were told the work will take place through December. Continue reading →

Check your contacts: Here is Mayor-elect Wilson’s 60-member transition team including Capitol Hill and Central District connections

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(Image: Wilson for Seattle)

Mayor-elect Katie Wilson has announced a 60-member transition team with a handful of Capitol Hill and Central District connections as she spends December preparing to take office in the new year.

Wilson says the team will focus on “housing, business, labor, arts, community safety, civil rights, transportation and other fields.”

For the city’s residents, business owners, and workers, the roster is an invitation to fire off an email, dig through your contacts to send a thoughtful text message, or make a phone call to speak up for what priorities you want to see the new Wilson administration pursuing first and hardest.

“Over the next several weeks, members of the transition team will identify and reach out to dozens of additional community advisors to gather the broadest possible range of input, identify priorities, and help equip Mayor-elect Wilson to successfully execute her vision as the next mayor of Seattle,” the announcement reads. Continue reading →

Group holding Seattle scooter ‘public safety forum’

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(Image: City of Seattle)

A community group making increased efforts to represent residents living in Seattle’s core neighborhoods including Capitol Hill and downtown is hosting a “public safety forum” on scooters Tuesday night.

The meeting comes as city officials including outgoing Mayor Bruce Harrell have said more must be done to address safety issues around rental electric scooters including dangerous sidewalk riding and haphazard parking. Continue reading →

Shop local, shop the Hill: 60+ places to walk and shop on Capitol Hill — UPDATE

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Like any good holiday shopping list, CHS is sure we’ve missed something! Please holler if we’ve left off your favorite Capitol Hill shop in our roster of areas to walk and shop in neighborhoods across the Hill. We’ll make updates as needed.

The roster of more than 60 stores, boutiques, and a gallery or two is an eclectic mix. It is also extremely local. CHS has intentionally left out chains and retailers with national or international reach. We hope it will inspire more than a few walks or rides as you make way through this year’s gift giving list. You can find a link to the “Shop the Hill” list in the menu above. Happy holidays from CHS!

Elliott Bay Book Company

Pike/Pine

    • Elliott Bay Book Company: The neighborhood’s retail soul; a massive independent bookstore.
    • BAIT: A sneaker and streetwear boutique stocking limited releases.
    • Otherworld Wine: A bottle shop and bar focusing on natural wines.
    • Couch: A local custom furniture showroom specializing in made-to-order sofas.
    • Break Away Vintage: A vintage store on Pike specializing in streetwear and nostalgia.
    • Late Night Vintage: A collective of vintage vendors offering a late-night shopping experience for clothing, records, and collectibles.
    • La Cha Bliss: A wine shop on 12th Ave offering a curated selection and tasting events.
    • Standard Goods: A staple for contemporary Pacific Northwest style, gifts, and accessories. Continue reading →

First year at Donna Jean’s Place, a Capitol Hill shelter where time is the most important resource

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(Image: Donna Jean’s Place)

By Moa Segerholt, UW News Lab

After being homeless three different times in Seattle, 60-year-old Benev Brandt says that Donna Jean’s Place is the best shelter she’s ever been in.

“Physically, I could find a safe place to sleep. And mentally, I could find a place to rest,” said Brandt.

Brandt says she has been homeless most her life and came to Seattle from California when she was 21. She has stayed at numerous shelters, but Donna Jean’s has provided her the most lasting healing, she says.

Donna Jean’s Place is a women’s emergency shelter that opened on northern Capitol Hill early this year as a collaboration between Operation Nightwatch and St. Mark’s Episcopal Cathedral.

Deacon Frank DiGirolamo, executive director of Operation Nightwatch, says he hoped that the shelter would help 100 women annually.

Since the opening at St. Mark’s last winter, the number has grown beyond expectations. DiGirolamo said that they’ve already helped more than 230 women at the shelter — named in honor of Donna Jean Palmberg, the widow of Operation Nightwatch’s founder — in the past year.

“This provides 7,000 nights of shelter per year, which sounds small – only 20 people per night, right? – But that’s 7,000 times that someone won’t be subject to being harassed or assaulted. So we think that’s a little seed of effort that can grow a lot,” Digirolamo said.

Donna Jean’s might also show that one of the most important resources a shelter can provide is time.

Continue reading →

Hugo House announces new permanent executive director — and says the book almost closed on the Capitol Hill literary arts center in 2024

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Pepe Montero will become the permanent executive director (Image: Hugo House)

Capitol Hill literary arts center Hugo House announced a new leader this week. The 11th Ave nonprofit announced Pepe Montero has accepted the position of permanent executive director.

The appointment marks the culmination of what it says has been an eighteen-month recovery period for the Capitol Hill literary center, which narrowly avoided permanent closure in early 2024.

“The path to this announcement began during one of the most difficult chapters in Hugo House’s history,” the announcement reads. “We found ourselves with a mostly new board and a completely overwhelming question: who could we get to run the place?”

The transition from interim to permanent leadership comes after a challenging period for the arts organization. CHS reported here in early 2024 as its then-director resigned amid ongoing challenges.

Hugo House was founded in 1996 and had been well-positioned among Capitol Hill and the city’s strongest arts nonprofits. In 2018, it opened its new 9,600-square-foot writing center on the ground floor of the new mixed-use apartment building developed on the corner Hugo House has called home since the late 1990s. Continue reading →

Paradise adds Birrieria Jalisco #1 to its Broadway mix

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A seat at the Paradise bar

One thing you have to hand the recent generation of new Capitol Hill restaurants moving into old Capitol Hill restaurant spaces is that they work hard. Places like Mint and Martini — an Indian joint that moved into former Barrio space on 12th Ave — and Broadway’s Paradise in the long ago home of the Broadway Grill will be open this Thursday when much of the rest of the Hill’s restaurants will be closed for Thanksgiving.

(Capitol Hill’s bars are another story with many open for the holiday for when you and friends and family could most use a drink.)

Paradise continues to hustle. CHS reported last November as the Mexican restaurant and bar moved in after the closure of Olmstead in the former Broadway Grill space. Continue reading →

Maps show how Katie Wilson won in Seattle including strength in Capitol Hill and the city’s most densely populated neighborhoods

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The final margin will be around 2,017 votes but — especially in our new era of highly optimized political campaigns driven by data and block by block analysis — a win is a win.

With King County Elections set Tuesday to certify the results of Mayor-elect Katie Wilson’s November victory in Seattle, here is a look at how the political battle played out in maps of Seattle and the neighborhoods around Capitol Hill and the Central District.

We also have a few maps showing the borders for the month’s other progressive victories including a few neighbor vs. neighbor political battlefronts.

This summer as we examined mapping of the August primary, CHS asked, “Who didn’t vote for Katie Wilson on Capitol Hill?” after the Capitol Hill renter’s impressive showing in the neighborhood helped drive an even more impressive top showing in the primary.

Today, as the mayor-elect is forming her transition team, laying out first priorities around homelessness, and preparing to work with an also-new city council, Wilson is preparing to take office in a city where the mayoral vote seemed to split across precincts by lines that delineate differences around wealth, ownership, and equity. Her summer trend held on in November but the Capitol Hill and Central District border skirmishes with incumbent Mayor Bruce Harrell supporters made for a less decisive victory in Wilson’s home area in November. Continue reading →

Seattle Social Housing: On track to have first property inked in 2026

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The newly formed Seattle Social Housing organization and CEO Roberto Jimenez are preparing for the first full round of funding in 2026 as the public developer begins its mission to build and acquire buildings for affordable housing.

In an update, the organization says it has issued its first “request for information” for developers to identify “existing properties” Seattle Social Housing could acquire and make part of its program: Continue reading →

Suspicious death investigated at encampments below Capitol Hill I-5 overpass — UPDATE

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The Seattle Police Department says there were “suspicious circumstances” after a person was found dead last week near encampments under the Pike and Pine overpasses of I-5 below Plymouth Pillars Park.

A man who told police he was coming to visit. friend at the encampment area above I-5 reported the body around 12:30 PM Wednesday.

Seattle Fire was called to the scene and confirmed the death. “Upon closer inspection, there were signs of suspicious circumstances,” police investigating the scene reported. Continue reading →