The Pioneer Square rennaissance is through with fits & starts
There are new bars and restaurants, yes, but also the new housing, retail and amenities that drive real city living.
By Mark Hinshaw
August 05, 2014
The Pioneer Square rennaissance is through with fits & starts.There are new bars and restaurants, yes, but also the new housing, retail and amenities that drive real city living.
In the thirty-five years that I’ve lived in Seattle, much of it working and living in or near Pioneer Square, I cannot recall so much buzz about the place. A couple of years ago, I wrote about what was beginning to happen in Seattle’s “first neighborhood”. Little did I know that things would take off as much as they have.
Today, cocktail bar Intermezzo Carmine (411 1st Ave S.), with a look straight out of the Left Bank, has finally given Carmine’s Terrazzo a street-facing presence. Down the street, swanky Damn the Weather (116 1st Ave S.) is packed by early evening. Radici (the re-named Tinello) on 2nd Ave S. is bustling day and night, despite not being in the busy First Avenue corridor, and the BRGR Bar on Occidental Park (111 Occidental Ave S.) has reinvented itself with great, inexpensive food and an upgraded interior ambience.
Last week, these were joined by the legendary Taylor Shellfish (410 Occidental Ave S.), which sold out of its stock within hours of opening.
Soon to open is Pizzeria Gabbiano on Main St., a sister restaurant to the Square's beacon of handmade pasta, Il Corvo. That will be followed by GoodBar next door and then, later in the year, Il Boccone — just a couple of blocks to the west. Over at Stadium Place on King Street, Josh Henderson of Skillet and Westward fame is readying sports bar Quality Athletics for a fall opening. Soon after, it will be joined by a Korean restaurant.
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The relatively new London Plane is just one of the Matt Dillon joints driving even more neighborhood investment. Image: Sean Conner
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