I was asked to look at and photograph a million-some dollar house just being completed in Kirkland recently. A few blocks away, I snapped pictures of these three water view houses:
Welcome to an unusual website, a cataloging, an urban archaeological "dig" into a mood, an attitude, called "modern", as represented in cool architecture around the Seattle area. Architecture that typically has sunny walls of glass, sometimes from floor to ceiling, soaring beamed wood ceilings, slate entries, flagstone/sandstone fireplaces, big overhangs, and other bold breaks from traditionalism. I hope this will be the least boring real estate website around, particularly if you like the potential of modern design and architecture, and how sublime it can be when done right.
Most of what is shown here is now, or was recently, AVAILABLE FOR YOU TO PURCHASE!, which is why I am showing them here and making listing such properties my specialty, my passion. My background is in architectural design, but my occupation is mainly that of real estate brokerage. My hobby is collecting furniture, buildings, and other artifacts from the modern era, and encouraging its revival. If you are just looking for design ideas, or looking to buy something, I hope you will find this site inspiring! One stranger emailed me saying that my enthusiasm was infectious.
Check out the almost full page article, with 4 illustrations, written exclusively on me and my web site on page 52 of the April 2000 issue of House & Garden magazine.
Pull up a chair, get comfortable, and prepare for a journey through space and time, into the future...your dream "home on the lounge", the "home of tomorrow", awaits you...
Walls of glass, floor to ceiling, flagstone/sandstone walls and fireplaces, metal and glass, slate entryways, starburst clocks, patios, soaring vaulted beamed ceilings, north Aurora Avenue with its quickly disappearing "Googie" signs from the fifties, under-appreciated visionary architecture and architects, cool furniture and the "hip groovy bachelor pad" look.
These things are my hobby, my occupation, my passion, to scour ALL the listings in the entire area!, and boldly bring the coolest undiscovered modernist architecture to you, updated every week: Architecture and architecturally inspired unique "mid-century", post war, 50's 60's 70's and newer modern ultramodern space-age futuristic retro modern radical or just plain unusual, quirky, unconventional, non-traditional or curiously different architecturally designed real estate for sale in and around Seattle.
In addition to my design background, I am an associate real estate broker, call me at: (206) 841-0003, to buy or sell or otherwise feature, talk about, photograph, etc, your cool building, home, retro interior/furniture, store, etc!! I'd love to talk to you!
House & Garden magazine devoted almost a full page of their April 2000 issue exclusively to me and this website (unsolicited), complete with 2 of my architectural drawings and several photographs.
I was also invited to and toured the offices of the wonderful design/fashion/travel/architecture magazine called "Wallpaper*", check it out!
Call me at: (206) 841-0003 if you want help in finding or listing a home.
To continue to the next page, click on the "continue on" button below, or to skip my story and go directly to this weeks "new listings", click on that button:
Remember to bookmark this site! and tell your friends about my site, also email me with any comments or suggestions on how to improve it! I may not be able to return every email right away, but I do look forward to them! If you REALLY want to reach me, the best way to make sure you do is via the good old fashioned telephone:
phone me at: (206) LIBERTY ,that is: (206) 542-3789, mobile phone: (206) 841-0003
<here's
a swingin' bachelor pad "wall of glass on the water" from a 1962
Motorola stereo ad
<These
3 photos are of a listing that I wrote up that the seller accepted our offer on, I have been told
the home was originally designed by Paul Hayden Kirk's office, and engineered by the same man who did the Rainier Tower downtown and the
Kingdome, (the most amazing structural engineer, the master of the reinforced
concrete swooping "hyperbolic paraboloid", who, needless to say, is
not too happy about the destruction of his Kingdome). Originally a church when
built in '62, and later converted to a hedonistic bachelor pad, ( I'm told it
was featured in an early 80's issue of Playboy magazine!). This incredibly unique
house was listed for $485,000, (sold)
<Here's a picture of a cool apt.
bldg in Crown Hill, with a for rent sign in the window,
<Paul
Allen's "ExperienceMusicProject" near the Space Needle,
here's a shot I took on opening weekend, Frank Gehry is the architect. The
monorail cuts through the middle of it, ...James Brown
walked through it, you could shake his hand, Hu!!!Yeea!!!Get ON Up!!!!
Getting back to some 50's/60's architecture I photographed recently around town: here's a dentist office on 1st Ave in Burien, just a marvel of rugged flagstone walls, flat roof overhangs, glass, and minimalist cool:
<a pharmacy/medical building on super-busy 85th Street just east of 15th Ave
NW in Crown Hill, you probably have driven by and never noticed...
<OHMYGOD!!!WOW!!!
the Frank Lloyd Wright-style house in these two pix above was listed late April 2000, built in
1963, in Seattle, appx 3,300 sq ft, 4 bedrooms, Lake
WA view, sunken living room, 2 floor-to-ceiling fireplaces, priced under $590K
(sold).
<another
sensational listing, built 1960, $365K!!!, Sound and mountain views,
enormous living and dining room.
Properties that harken back to another time, when Seattle had it's first post war boom, the 50's, 60's, even some of the 70's, an until recently neglected era teeming with optimism for the future (When I look at some of my architectural design, Met Home, etc magazines from the 80's, they seem lost in a depressed oil crisis/AIDS/inflation etc., semi old fashioned, traditional, anti-modern/post modern hangover. Anything fifties or sixties is amazingly missing, regarded as tacky and passe', I found an article in Metropolitan Home where someone took a beautiful 50's style house in Issaquah, and, at great cost, tacked on a lot of gingerbread to make it into a pseudo-Arts and Crafts, semi-"Craftsman" style bungalow, with tapering porch columns, smaller windows, and lots of brick a brac added to make it "charming", sure, I have nothing against that early revolution of the bungalow Gustav Stickley-esque style, but it is only now reaching the developers in the suburbs, they think it's the latest thing, almost radical, to add heavy porch columns that taper as they head upwards, and ornamental dividers in the glass and heavy overhangs. I don't mind it, but it is behind the times. Oh well, things just take time to catch up, I guess. Maybe someday they will start doing Charles Eames style, and then Frank Gehry style, we shall see....
I read a definition of modernism: a belief that the future will be BETTER than the past. An upbeat, uptempo, attitude, back to a forward time, as contradictory as that sounds. The future that never was returns anew, seen with new eyes. This is more than just a nostalgia or tacky "kitsch" trip, don't get me wrong, a dash of tacky is essential, I like the martini/lava/Tiki lounge/martini/James Bond retro touch. I love thrift store shopping, but I prefer to do it with real estate, and I like to find the jewels of quality in amongst the boring stuff. That is what I seek out, each week I hunt, and show the results each week here in the "new" section. The momentum is building, In London, there is now a store called "American Retro Home", the cobwebs of mundane predictable traditional design and aesthetic mediocrity are herein being thrust aside.
Lets get down, get groovy, get cool; check out my galaxy of futuristic "Jetsons"-esque, postwar, Mid-Century Modern, 1962 Seattle world's fair (when it seems as if half the city was built. I'm seeking out anything from the 50's to the 70's (I'm not quite ready for an 80's revival yet), or current contemporary, anything that seems "modern", architecturally inspired, not necessarily "kitschy" or tacky at all, but fun, yes. Fun design that makes one reexamine how things should or could look. Unusual, offbeat properties. Design that makes you go "Yea Baby"! The majority of properties listed here, amazingly, are for sale! (given that I am a real estate broker/architectural designer, that's my gig) I can't believe it, people selling bits of incredible history, architectural marvels, some who have been surrounded by their house so long, they don't even realize how great their house is. Be a part of this new modernist movement and own a piece of it! Get your mojo for modern in motion...
Here's a picture of a car dealer on 1st Ave in Burien:
<Here's
a building not in Seattle, but in an ad in a recent issue of "Gear"
magazine. Isn't the roofline, the brickwork, the tall glass AWESOME? These are
the kind of properties coming back in vogue, I know several architects on the verge of
re-creating just this type of style, and it is around Seattle all over the
place, it's amazing how much new inventory shows up for sale every week, (I
update this site normally EVERY week for Saturday morning viewing of the latest cool
properties). I'm also amazed how the majority of the population still views it
as if it's not even there, it is, for the most part, still under-recognized and under-appreciated,
which is good news for buyers, for the time being, until it all gets as totally
discovered and unaffordable as the furniture pieces of Herman Miller, Knoll,
Eames, Bertoia, Saarinen, Jacobsen, etc...
<Here's
a Lionel Train Co. toy called the "UFO Cafe", a great 60's design.
Have a bowl of "Atomic Chile", like the sign says, and blast off!
Click on "continue on to historical" to continue your tour and learn
more about me and this site, or click on "new" to go directly to the
weekly updates of the newest listings for sale, updated for every Saturday
morning...
Remember to bookmark this site! and tell your friends about my site, also email me with any comments or suggestions on how to improve it! Thanks!,
Tom Holst, Associate Broker,
phone: (206) 841-0003,
Western Associates Real Estate, 9020 Greenwood Ave N. Seattle WA 98103 USA. Webmaster: Tom Holst, copyright 1999, 2000 by Tom Holst, all rights reserved. Some properties here may be pending sale, sold, expired, or otherwise off-market, if a picture of your property is here and you would prefer it not be shown on this website, please contact me and I will remove it immediately. All data herein including that from the NorthWest Multiple Listing Service is furnished without verification and MLS and Tom Holst assume no responsibilities for errors or omissions, whether occasioned by them or others. Listings subject to price change, correction, errors, omission, prior sale, or withdrawal.