Northwest Home (published inside Seattle magazine) partners with AIA Seattle every other month to feature an architect designed residential project and offer an open house tour to the public. January’s open house was today from noon to 3pm. It was a houseboat on Lake Union designed by Dan Nelson of Designs Northwest Architects based in Stanwood. It’s actually a floating home dwelling and not a houseboat since none of the house exists below the water. The owner is a commercial contractor. A British Columbia company created the float out of concrete, rebar and Styrofoam. The float was sent down to Seattle on a barge where they would raise the rest of the house in the shipyards near the slip. Imagine not being able to use a plumb-bob or level and having to assume that the slab is straight and square off from there. Now those are some crazy construction conditions!
Here are a few pictures I took during the Open House Tour:
The houseboat
The exterior materials are reminiscent of an industrial cargo shipping crate.
Spiral stair to rooftop
Rooftop complete with a putting green
The view
Space Needle view and neighboring houseboat
Here are a few neighboring houseboats on the same dock.
I had admired this houseboat when I was researching architecture firms for a new job when we moved. I feel for this exterior photo at night, but I don’t feel it has as great of a presence on a rainy barely lit day. The warmth of the wood doesn’t read through anymore.
The 2,134 square foot home features 2 motorized garage doors opening the living room to the lake.
Awesome open stair.
The corner bathroom window is awesome.
Entry door.
A little history…Houseboats started cropping up in the area in the 1890s, when sailors, fishermen and dock workers in Elliott Bay built homes on rafts. During the Depression, low-income laborers took advantage of the geography and built or moved into tax-free houseboats. The houseboat population peaked in the 1930s, at about 2,000, but has since dropped to around 500. Still, Seattle boasts one of the country’s largest houseboat communities.
The 1993 Sleepless in Seattle film brought houseboats as an iconic must-see destination in the Emerald City. The 2,075 square foot houseboat was built in 1978 with 4 bedrooms, 2 baths and is one of the largest floating homes on Lake Union. It was put on the market in 2008 for $2.5 million. It boosts beautiful exposed wood beams in the main living spaces as it did in the movie. The wrap-around floating decks have amazing views. It’s actually located at 2460 Westlake Avenue North, almost directly across Lake Union from 2369 Fairview Ave, the houseboat I toured, but the day wasn’t clear even and my camera phone didn’t have a strong enough zoom. I guess I’ll just have to drag Joe over there this summer and kayak by for a closer look since it’s on the end of another private dock.
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