by Lucia Athens
Seattle, Washington
Today, the City of Seattle and the National Trust for Historic Preservation announced a unique partnership: the new Green Preservation Lab. The lab partners will help develop policies for existing buildings and neighborhoods to make them more green and energy efficient. Help is needed in this arena, as the needs of preservation and the needs of energy efficiency can sometimes be in conflict with issues such as replacement windows negatively impacting the aesthetic of historic structures. A clearinghouse for resources on green building rehab will also be available at the New Lab. The announcement followed a keynote speech by Richard Moe, the President of the National Trust, the previous evening. The lecture was held at the sanctuary of the Seattle First United Methodist Church (now Daniels Recital Hall), a building that was narrowly saved from the wrecking ball. Kevin Daniels of Daniels Development and Diane Sugimura, Director of Seattle’s Department of Planning and Development, undertook an heroic effort to save the gorgeous structure, one of the few attractive buildings in that particular corner of downtown. As I sat there under the domed roof, gazing up at the stained glass windows and the massive pipe organ, it amazed me that anyone ever could have considered razing the building to the ground, or in fact that it’s even legal to do so.
Seattle’s outstanding historic building stock is an under-recognized resource in our city, that has not been front and center in the green building dialogue. Thank goodness that’s changing now. There is nothing more green you can do than keep an existing building in service, rather than building a new one. The press announcement by Moe and Mayor Greg Nickels was held in the Joseph Vance Building, an historic building that has been revitalized by Jonathan Rose Companies LLC. Mr. Rose is a visionary developer from NYC. See www.rose-network.com The building now houses quite a few sustainability-minded tenants, including the nonprofit Sightline. Dubuque, Iowa and San Francisco have been selected as other partner cities in the National Trust’s initiative. For more info on all three of the Labs, see http://www.preservationnation.org/issues/sustainability/green-lab/
The new Center will be housed at the Piston & Ring Building, 1429 12th Ave, on Capitol Hill. Liz Dunn, noted preservationist and the new Director of the Green Preservation Lab, previously helped to save the building along with Pacific Supply and the Melrose Triangle Building, considered to be part of “auto row” and charming signifiers of the area’s previous architectural heritage. Let’s hope that someday soon, there might even be incentives offered by Seattle Public Utilities, in conjunction with Seattle City Light, to support the preservation of historic structures as well as their updating to make them green and energy efficient. Keeping materials out of the landfill AND reducing greenhouse gas emissions and energy use: now that’s something to write home about.
