Gage Academy hosts its final Drawing Jam before move off Capitol Hill

(Image: Gage Academy)

By next summer, the Gage Academy of Art will have left Capitol Hill. CHS reported here on the planned move for the school after decades on the St. Mark’s campus as the church prepares for planned housing development on its 10th Ave E property.

This weekend might be a fitting time to stop in to say goodbye as Gage hosts its final Drawing Jame on Capitol Hill:

The annual event is a celebration of the school and brings “artists and art-lovers of all ages together to enjoy the simple act of putting hand to paper, using different locales, subjects and events to engage the public in observational drawing.”

The arts academy has its future lined out with an agreement to move next year into a South Lake Amazon office building where the 35-year-old school will become the ground-floor presence below floors of Amazon workers above.

 

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With Gage Academy move and new grant, St. Mark’s moves forward on plan to develop ‘multigenerational housing’ on its Capitol Hill campus — UPDATE

(Image: St. Mark’s)

Gage Academy and Bright Water School are creating new futures off Capitol Hill as St. Mark’s moves closer to creating new, affordable “multigenerational housing” on its 10th Ave campus.

The long-planned development effort is starting to speed up. The Saint Mark’s Episcopal Cathedral announced it has received a $100,000 grant from Trinity Church Wall Street, an organization that helps churches and faith organizations fund feasibility and predevelopment costs. The boost will start new wheels turning on a mission at St. Mark’s to put its northern Capitol Hill land to use helping to address the housing and affordability crisis in the city.

St. Mark’s says the grant will span a six-month period through April 2024 and support the completion of key assessments of the St. Nicholas portion of its campus including financial feasibility, geotechnical surveys, environmental and historic building rehabilitation studies.

CHS reported here in 2020 on the future of the campus’s St. Nicholas building that had been home to Gage Academy and the Bright Water School. The private Waldorf school Bright Water already made its move off the Hill. Now arts academy Gage has its future lined out with an agreement to move into a South Lake Amazon office building where the 35-year-old school will become the ground-floor presence below floors of Amazon workers above next year.

UPDATE: CHS failed to include Amistad School in our initial report. The “two-way (Spanish/English) immersion school serving toddlers, Pre-K through 8th grade” has made the campus its home and remains active on 10th Ave E. We’ll follow up to learn more about the school’s long-term plans.

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Capitol Hill fall tradition the Seattle Weavers’ Guild sale returns to St. Mark’s

(Image: CHS)

An October cold snap will definitely put you in the mood. It is time again for the Seattle Weavers’ Guild Annual Show & Sale at Capitol Hill’s St. Mark’s.

The annual fall event offers access to the “northwest’s largest selections of handcrafted, handwoven items, including apparel, accessories, kitchen linens, table linens, baskets, home decor, tapestries, rugs, gift items, jewelry and more.” All items are handmade by the guild’s hundreds of Seattle-area members.

But the best part is meeting the creators and watching their busy hands at work. Here’s a CHS classic visit to the sale nine years ago. We can assure you not a lot has changed.

The free event takes place Thursday 5 PM to 8 PM, Friday 10 AM to 8 PM and Saturday 10 AM to 4 PM in Bloedel Hall below St. Mark’s at 1245 10th Ave E.

You can learn more at swg-sale.com.

 

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Gardens and mutual aid? Process begins to shape Capitol Hill’s last* new park

 

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The Cass Turnbull Garden already calls the property home. How it fits into the plans for the future park will be part of the process (Image: Cass Turnbull Garden)

There was a time when we thought Broadway Hill Park would be the last of its kind — 12,000 square feet of grass, benches, community gardening space, and a BBQ grill in the middle of Capitol Hill.

There is another.

The Seattle Parks department has started the public planning process to reshape the 1.6 acre property left to the city by philanthropist Kay Bullitt at her 2021 death as a new city park. A survey has been launched and public meetings are coming.

The path to create the park will not be straight. The city must now navigate the “unique opportunity” to transform a private Capitol Hill yard already promised and in use as a community garden space into a public park serving communities far beyond Capitol Hill’s northern mansions and the overgrown greenbelt surrounding St. Mark’s Cathedral. Landmarks considerations and the city’s ongoing homelessness crisis and recent park sweeps will also shape the conversation.

Given the importance of the land at Harvard Ave E at E Prospect on the northeast slopes of Capitol Hill above I-5, it might not be surprising there is already a vision for its place in the community. Continue reading

Kay Bullitt: A legacy of Seattle philanthropy — and a new Capitol Hill park

A view of the Cass Turnbull Garden (Image: Plant Amnesty)

Kay Bullitt

On the Capitol Hill of the future, the Bullitt name will evoke ideals of environmental conservation, public space in the shape of a northern Capitol Hill park, and gardens — in its past, a legacy of lumber and broadcasting, and a remarkable Capitol Hill resident who used her family fortune to support “a dizzying array of causes spanning education, racial justice, international relations, politics, historic-landmark preservation and the arts.

It’s a legacy strong enough to create something nearly impossible on an increasingly packed Capitol Hill — a new park. Continue reading

After 16 months, you can attend Capitol Hill’s St. Mark’s Compline Service again

Kevin Johnson/Saint Mark’s Cathedral

For 16 months, the 65-year tradition of the Compline Service at Saint Mark’s has continued through the pandemic — but in an empty cathedral. Sunday, full life returns to the Episcopal Cathedral on Capitol Hill as the weekly service reopens to the public:

During the pandemic, the safety of the congregation and the choir members has been a priority, with careful consideration given to ventilation of the space, protocols while in the cathedral, and isolation after possible exposure. There have been no known instances of COVID transmission inside Saint Mark’s Cathedral. All singers are fully vaccinated, and the choir remains masked at all times. Following current guidelines, masks are recommended for those attending the service at this time. A portion of the seats in the church are set apart as a “distanced section,” and those who choose to sit in that section are required to remain masked and distanced from others.

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St. Mark’s illuminated with names of people killed by police

(Image: ACLU of Washington)

Tuesday night, a message of remembrance appeared on the granite walls of Capitol Hill’s St. Mark’s Cathedral, visible from I-5 and across the city: GEORGE FLOYD SHOULD STILL BE ALIVE TODAY.

From May 25th, the one year anniversary of the police killing of George Floyd and of the start of the wave of Black Lives Matter protests that followed in Seattle and across the country, through June 8th, projections of the names of dozens of people killed by police will be projected onto the west façade of the North Capitol Hill house of worship in a project from St. Mark’s and the ACLU of Washington:

While the project began with George Floyd’s name on May 25, all other names will be those of people killed in Washington, including King, Pierce, Clark, and Snohomish Counties. The goal is to preserve the memory of local cases that may be in danger of being forgotten, and to serve as a reminder that these tragedies occur in Washington too, not just in other states. In Washington, about 40 to 50 people are killed by police officers each year. These victims are disproportionately Black, Brown, Indigenous, and Asian American Pacific Islander Washingtonians. The individuals whose names will be projected onto the cathedral have been included with the consent and support of their families through the WCPA, an organization which centers the voices of impacted family members whose loved ones have been killed by police.

You can also visit projectingjustice.org to learn more about the lives of those named as well as the circumstances of their killings, the ACLU says.

The names will be projected beginning at sunset and continuing for at least two hours each night.

 

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Bright Water School plans new home off Capitol Hill

Last fall in the grips of the COVID-19 crisis, CHS reported on the tough financial decisions facing Capitol Hill’s Bright Water that had the private Waldorf school planning to shut down. But buoyed with hopes of federal funding, administrators and families opted to keep the school going. Now they’re planning on a new home.

Bright Water announced earlier this month it is moving to the Japanese Cultural and Community Center of Washington on S Weller just off Rainier. Continue reading

Explosions reported as fire scorches St. Mark’s greenbelt

Flames burned below St. Mark’s Cathedral Wednesday night as Seattle Fire battled a stubborn brush fire in the nearby greenbelt on the western edge of Capitol Hill above I-5.

Seattle Fire units were called to the scene along the 1300 block of Lakeview Ave E just after 8:30 PM as the fire spread and explosions were reported at an encampment in the brushy area. Continue reading

Housing of God? St. Mark’s Cathedral considers future plans for its St. Nicholas building home to Gage Academy and Bright Water School

The St. Nicholas building (Image: The Bright Water School)

There could someday be more than housing for more than the Maker at St. Mark’s Cathedral but any possible changes are still years off as the congregation of Saint Mark’s is beginning considerations of what to do with a signature part of its 10th Ave E campus, the St. Nicholas building. A consultant has recommended changing the building into a multi-family residential development.

The building at 1501 10th Ave E, just north of the cathedral proper, is home to the Gage Academy of Art and the Bright Water Waldorf School. Both of these schools have leases that run through 2023, and the church is in the early phases of deciding what to do with the building when those leases run out.

Even though the consultants have made a recommendation, the Very Rev. Steven Thomason, dean and rector of St. Mark’s stressed that the church is still weighing its options, and that nothing is happening in the immediate future.

“We are not making any decision, any time soon, about what to do with the building,” he said.

The church’s involvement in the property stretches back to 2003. At the time, St. Mark’s and a group called the Willow Trust purchased the building from then-owner Cornish with an eye toward converting it into a parish life center. The church wasn’t ready to move forward with the life center at the time, and so they began renting it out (technically subleasing it, since the building is officially owned by an LLC made up of the church and the trust and then leased to the church) to Gage and Bright Water.

Now the members of the Willow Trust, who have thus far remained anonymous, are granting full ownership of the building to the church. So, the church is beginning consideration of what it will do with the property. Continue reading