Apartments slated for Crown Hill Hardware site and two other lots

Geeky Swedes Ballard

Since Crown Hill Hardware announced it was closing back in November — one of the longest-running businesses in North Seattle — we’ve been waiting to see what’s planned for the property.

Today plans were filed with the city to build apartments at both the Crown Hill Hardware site and the adjacent parking lot — and on two other lots on the same block, as well.

That’s a total of four lots and four different 4-story, 21-unit apartment buildings. The Crown Hill Hardware site will have two side-by-side, and 7709 and 7711 15th Ave. NW will be the home of the other two (currently occupied by two houses.)

Of the 21 units for each building, 18 of them are small efficiency dwelling units. Since these are high-density developments along a major transportation corridor, each building is planning to offer parking for 4 vehicles.

The architect on the project is Lemon Architecture.

Geeky Swedes

The founders of My Ballard

38 thoughts to “Apartments slated for Crown Hill Hardware site and two other lots”

  2. No parking. Check out the website for Lemon. One hipster in charge and two assistant hipsters. Nice portfolio of boxes with stairs thus accomplishing the dual objective of insanely ugly pod buildings that are difficult for people with disabilities. (Or impossible; hard to see from the pictures.) 21 pods per building w/four parking spaces per BUILDING. Cool. Rule hipsters, rule.

  3. I like it! Supply and demand baby! We need a lot more of this if we want to keep rents more affordable. And it sure beats the idea of rent control. Now if we could get the cost of permitting down that would help too. With 4 parking spaces for 21 units this won’t work for everyone but with Uber and on a major bus line this will work for many many people. And that’s what Seattle needs more of, alternatives.

      1. Agreed. Micro-units are far too expensive for what they offer, and 15th Ave already has a similar buildings slated for 65th and just north of 83rd. The neighborhood BADLY needs modest 2 bedroom apartments (with elevator access) that can be shared by families, roommates or seniors. Unfortunately, that is not a business model that developers seem to want to provide.

        1. Won’t ever happen. There is no money is affordable housing and Seattle was built on greed and has not changed since the founding.

    3. So what makes you think folks with cars will bed riding the bus? And if they do, where is their car(s). On the damned street, of course. So less parking for all.

  5. Lets push them to add more parking than that. The Seattle Time analysis recently showed that more cars were moving to Seattle than people and those cars need parking. The City refuses to charge for any other infrastructure (like water and sewer pipes) that are needed for these developments so property owners should demand that the developers at least have to provide off street parking.

    1. Why do you care if other people don’t want parking? If you own a car you’ll rent somewhere else, let people have options if they don’t own a car. This apartment will be on the D line and a short walk from the soon-to-be Rapid Ride 40, so it’s really the perfect place to attract transit riders.

      1. NOooo. If you own a car or not you will opt for the digs most close to your pocketbook. If there is inside parking GREAT. If not we’ll rent anyway and put the car on the street.

    2. And just who and how do we push? The damned council doesn’t care about the citizens. All they want is more and more money to waste on bums and druggies.

  7. I really hope they put a GOOD coffee shop (dog friendly would be so helpful) in the retail space! I think the design looks awesome.

    1. Keep your dog away from food establishments, thanks. It’s unsanitary. Pathetic that not only do we have Mumbai-level poverty and street filth, but now you guys bring your dog everywhere. Metro is like a 3rd world bus on busy days. Woof

    2. The Dane is across the street. A hardware store, donut shop, sushi, Mexican or pancake restaurant in the retail space would be nice (all businesses the neighborhood has recently lost.)

  8. I hope all of these are not built at the same time. Traffic still needs to flow on 15th.

    I think it is sad that only 4 parking spots are provided. People still own cars and use them to get escape especially on weekends, ocean, mountains, beach, shopping, it’s a pain having to lug all your stuff around.

    How much are they going for?

    1. There are no details on that yet but the Townhomes on the next block are listed at $959k – they look pretty nice and great value!

  10. If you read Seattle Times there’s currently a glut of apartments so adding more will just add more to the glut!

    The article also said that some of these apartments are adding incentives for people to rent from them because they aren’t filling up enough

    Greed?

  11. Love to see 15th with more apartments for young people. In 10-20 more years these apts will be older (so more affordable ) and hopefully this increased density allows us to expand ST up Holman to Northgate.

    We do not want parking. Parking creates sprawl and traffic and idling, without density (density is measured by people living in a square mile not cars) you can’t get Real walk-friendly neighborhoods.

    I hope we get a crosswalk light at 77th now.

  12. 84 units and a whopping 16 off street parking spots. Please leave a can opener for me when you park 1 inch from both ends of my vehicle so I can attempt to drive off. Bye bye Ballard, you have flown.

  13. I liked the big red pipe wrench painted on the north side of the building. Drove by Friday and noticed it’s been painted over.
    It was the best public art in Ballard!

    1. Great local business??? Maybe 30 years ago. I have been here since 1997 and that hardware store was hardly open so I would go to Stone Way in Wallingford or True Value on Greenwood. Crown Hill was my closest store but it was hardly open and I would have to go to another hardware store to get what I needed.

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