Owner Washington Real Estate Holdings and developer Barrientos + Ryan are planning a mixed-use development at 225 Roy Street – Center Steps.
The project, called Center Steps, will contain two buildings over a shared garage with underground parking for 185 vehicles. One of the buildings will be 7 stories tall, the other 8 stories tall. The buildings will house 285 apartments. Amenities will include a shared fitness room and bike storage for 108. Each building will have south-facing roof decks. Units will range from studio to two-bedroom apartments.
The two buildings, separated by a pedestrian walkway, will also contain 9,000 square feet of street level retail along Roy and Mercer. The project will also include a 5,000 square foot public plaza with a water feature that will face Mercer.
The 46,000 L-shaped parcel of land was purchased in April for $16.2 million from Seattle Opera. The block was previously leased to Teatro ZinZanni for the past 10 years. The sale is helping Seattle Opera finance their new office that is being built on the site of the old Mercer Arena.
In the meantime, in a partnership with Uptown Alliance and Shunpike, Barrientos + Ryan is letting local artists work and exhibit at the site until December. Storefronts UN[contained], which opened Labor Day Weekend, is an expansion of the Center of Contemporary Art’s Lab Artist in Residence Program. The residency program is designed to support 12 socially engaged artists to create a platform for community dialogue around critical social issues. Artists will receive residencies in an 8 foot by 20 foot shipping container as well as financial support.
Construction is scheduled to begin next spring. GGLO is the architect and Hewitt is the landscape architect.