HomeStreet gets the doors open

After a very long gestation period, Seattle-based HomeStreet bank birthed its Madison Park baby today, finally revealing to the world its long-awaited branch along the neighborhood's main thoroughfare. The prominent Madison Street location next to Bert's Red Apple was most-recently the site of the Tully's, the much-lamented and long-departed coffee shop.  It's been almost two years since that exit.

HomeStreet would have been here earlier had it not been for the involved design and permitting processes and the fact that the hundred-plus-year-old building was in worse shape by far than originally anticipated.  The end result of all that rehabilitation is pretty impressive, however.  If you're willing to accept the fact that Madison Park is now a banking hub with five bank branches calling the neighborhood home, you will probably be pleased with the attractiveness and compatibility of HomeStreet's finished product. The bank sign apparently meets the community standards for its modest size, and the building doesn't look too bank-like. That, we're told, sits well with the neighborhood "powers that be" who try to enforce the various "village" standards.  Another concession to the community: the fireplace that graced Tully's is back in an improved form to add to the ambiance of the bank's interior.

While we certainly can't claim that HomeStreet is not a bank, it can be argued that it's a bank that is different from the others that (with the exception only of KeyBank) have been part of the Madison Park community for many decades.  Though they certainly didn't start out that way, each of the neighborhood's other four bank branches is a part of a big national bank organization based out of state---far out of state, in most cases (New York in the case of Chase, Ohio in the case of Key and North Carolina in the case of Bank of America).  Only Wells can make the claim that it's even based in the general region (California).

Not that there's anything wrong with being from out of state.  However, HomeStreet is definitely home grown, having been founded in Seattle as a mortgage company 93 years ago, later becoming a federally-chartered savings bank.  HomeStreet, with about $3.3 billion in assets, operates 31 branches, ten of these in Seattle.

In charge of HomeStreet's Madison Park location is Ila Wagner, who joined the bank from Chase during the past month.  She told us that she understands the fact that "there's a fear of over-saturation with banks in Madison Park."  But "HomeStreet will be a different kind of experience."  She cites the bank's intense involvement in the communities it serves as one example.  Also, HomeStreet is, we're told, the "official bank" of both the Seahawks and the Sounders, with promotions related to both teams (special deals for season ticket holders, for example).

While today is Day One for HomeStreet's Madison Park incarnation, the big official grand opening will take place for the community in early September.  That's when the bank will be giving away a lot of money.

Just kidding.  (About the money give-away, that is).

[As a matter of self disclosure for those not already aware of the fact, the Madison Park Blogger is a banker by day, though not an employee of any of the banks who operate branches in Madison Park.]

Seen or heard in the 'hood

New restaurant to take MP Conservatory space

Though we don't yet have the details, we do know that the space on 43rd Avenue E. vacated by Madison Park Conservatory in February will soon be the site of a new restaurant.  Owners Maria and Ricky Eng, doing business as Eng Seattle Restaurants, Inc., applied earlier this month for a liquor license for the site. Ricky Eng confirms that while the name is yet to be determined, the restaurant will definitely be a full-service, sit-down affair. We'll give you the full scoop when we have it.

Founder moves on but pizzeria still going strong

Tom Siegal, who created The Independent Pizzeria in 2010 and who has been the mainstay pizza maker ever since, moved to Providence, Rhode Island earlier this summer.  His wife was admitted to the prestigious Rhode Island School of Design--and Tom, quite naturally, decided to relocate to the East Coast to be with her while she's in school.

While Tom is maintaining his ownership of our neighborhood pizza joint, Joe Heffernan and the rest of The Independent Pizza crew are carrying on the four-year tradition of making excellent Neapolitan pizza in Madison Park.  National foodie website Epicurious tapped The Indpendent as having one of the 10 Top Pizzas in the U.S. last year.

Former Mad Pizza space undergoing refurbishment

Construction of a new interior, along with some exterior refurbishment, is underway at the old Mad Pizza location on E. Madison St.  So it looks like what's rumored to be an Asian eatery is going to be part of Madison Park's future.  What's apparently not in our future, however, is a taco stand at the location of the old Best Buds flower shop on E. Blaine.  Nothing much happening there since the notice was taken out of the window months ago.   Both sites have been vacant since last year.

Ann Marie elects to stay

Although Ann Marie Lingerie announced during Spring that it was giving up its "bricks and mortar" in the neighborhood and migrating to an exclusively on-line business, apparently the moving-out sale and the interest generated from the publicity resulted in a re-thinking of that business strategy.  Manager Felicia Klabo reported to us earlier this month that the shop is staying in place.  The efforts to increase Ann Marie's on-line presence continues unabated, however.

HomeStreet almost ready to enter banking scene

It's taken a long, long time to get to this point, but the new Madison Park HomeStreet Bank branch seems to be nearing completion, with an anticipated late August/early September opening date.  The one-time Tully's site, which was vacated in October 2012, has been under such an extensive repair program that it could almost be argued that the result is a new building.  The original structure is over one hundred years old and has served host to many different businesses along the way, but never a bank. What's happening to this space is part of a trend, however, of Madison Park becoming a banking hub. HomeStreet, when open, will be Bank Branch Number Five.

Whither our empty storefronts?

Neighborhood's retail vibrancy takes some hits

Those who care about the longterm health of Madison Park's business district no doubt shudder when contemplating the possibility that any more retail spaces might go the sad way of our community's notorious Black Hole---that tumble-down, two-out-of-three-shops-empty building at the very heart of what old-timers here term "The Village:"

The departure of Tully's, Best Buds, and Mad Pizza have each resulted in unfilled spaces that are definite detractors to neighborhood ambiance. Meanwhile, the recent exit of the Aegis sales office in the Villa Marina building on 43rd creates another retail space that could (but we understand won't) go begging.

As previously reported, a HomeStreet Bank branch will ultimately be replacing Tully's; and however one might feel about Madison Park as a banking hub, having another bank inserted into our midst at least gives us the advantage of swapping a boarded-up, hangdog building  for a newly refurbished one.

But the former Mad Pizza location (shown at the top) and original Best Buds site (above) are certainly looking a bit forlorn these days (or even perhaps vandalized, in the case of the latter).  The Mad Pizza space is in the building that also houses Marshall's Cleaners, whose owners, we understand, are also the landlords.  If the newly empty space is being marketed, however, it is not evidenced by any "for lease" signs; and the former fast-food store's interior is something less than market ready.  Our attempts to get a comment from the building's owners was not met with immediate success.

Down the street, Best Buds moved out of its one-time-travel-office location on E. Blaine and into the basement of Cafe Parco last summer. Though several parties have apparently expressed interest in the old space, no deal has apparently been struck. The most recent rumor we heard involved a taco stand.  (Cafe Parco, incidentally, reclaimed its downstairs space for use as a dining room when Best Buds closed shop last month.)

That leaves us with the former Aegis office space, where we can report some good news. We've learned that coming soon to this location will be an infrared sauna and deep massage therapy center (or something along those lines).  More on this later.

Bank reveals plans for ex-Tully's space

HomeStreet will arrive in 2014

It's official. The building that for many years housed the Madison Park Tully's  will ultimately be the site of Madison Park's fifth bank branch. But it's not going to happen anytime soon. Our story last week about the increasingly dilapidated state of that building (4036 E. Madison St.) has prompted HomeStreet Bank to confirm its intention to open a branch in Madison Park, as well as provide the timetable for its arrival.

In an email to the Madison Park Blogger yesterday, Terri Silver, HomeStreet's Corporate Communications Vice President, acknowledged that the Bank had leased the space and had recently met with the City and the building landlord to review plans for remodeling the 113-year-old building. "The remodel is quite extensive and will encompass both internal and external work," Silver noted. "We are very excited at the prospect of becoming a member of the community and are working on a design for the building that we believe will be ascetically pleasing and will fit well with its surroundings."  The graphic above shows what the branch will look like when completed, assuming that the City and building owner approve the design.

If everything goes according to plan, a permit may be issued for remodeling as early as October, with construction to be completed in early 2014, according to Silver.  Because of the multiple cases of vandalism since the building was vacated in late 2012, the Bank has requested and received permission to "wrap" the building, a process scheduled to begin later this week.

When HomeStreet opens its doors in Madison Park next year it will be the first locally-based bank to have a branch in the neighborhood since the demise of WaMu in early 2009.

[Graphic courtesy of HomeStreet Bank.]

What's the story?

Former Tully's site languishes

It's been almost ten months since Tully's abandoned its Madison Park location in a downsizing move last October.  And it's five months since the Madison Park Blogger reported that HomeStreet Bank would be opening a branch in the space.  Yet to date, about the only thing that's happened to the building is the addition of some graffiti.

One of the most-asked questions we hear is, "What's up with that Tully's space anyway?"  So we decided to see if we could get an answer from HomeStreet.  Karen Brandvick-Baker of the Bank's corporate communications department responded as follows:  "We do not announce potential new branch locations until we have received approval to open the branch. The location has not yet gone through that process."

In the meantime, presumably the Bank is paying rent on the lease, which was rumored to have been $10,000 per month or more when Tully's held the space.  So it may be an expensive waiting game for HomeStreet, which recently announced it's buying small banks in Seattle and Yakima.  Those purchases also require regulatory approval.

Madison Park: regional banking center

HomeStreet Bank to lease the former Tully's space?

Though the neighborhood is already home to four bank branches, Madison Parkers are apparently about to get a fifth banking option. According to our sources, HomeStreet Bank, a State-chartered savings bank based in Seattle, has leased the prime location that was vacated by Tully's last October (4036 E. Madison Street).  HomeStreet was unwilling to confirm the story "at this time" when we quizzed the Bank about it this morning.  Nevertheless, the Bank's commuications officer was helpful in correcting some errors in an early draft of this story, which we had forwarded to her for review.

Assuming our sources are accurate, HomeStreet will be moving in sometime later this year after extensive alterations to the 2,100 sq. ft building. In its previous lives the building, built in 1900, had been the home of several different retail operations. If a bank now takes the space, the move will further solidify Madison Park's growing reputation as a place where you can get a meal, have your hair done---or cash a check.

HomeStreet, which has 22 retail branches, has been ramping up in recent months, recently opening a new branch in Fremont and soon to open a 23rd branch on Capitol Hill.  As a community bank of modest size, it would be the only financial institution represented here that is not a major commercial bank (JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Wells Fargo and Key are each big national players).

The fact that another bank may be coming to the neighborhood rather than a new retail shop, however, will certainly reignite the debate that raged when Key Bank added itself to the mix in 2011. Many Madison Parkers argued then that landlords here have a responsibility to keep the supposedly village-like character of the business district intact by leasing only to retail shops. That argument didn't prevent Key Bank's move to Madison Park, and it didn't sway the landlord of 4036 E. Madison this time. It was clearly an economic decision.

We understand that the commercial real estate broker, when taking down the "For Lease" sign on the building late last week, told passersby that only a bank was willing to pay the cost of the lease (reported to be in the $9,000-$10,000 per month range). That rent is a tough nut for any retailer to crack, though there had apparently been interest in the space by many potential lessees. (For example, rumor has it that Bert's took a look at using the building for a wine & spirits shop but determined that there was not enough square footage).

Madison Park Business Association President Terry Short had this to say about the possible introduction of another bank into the business district:  "There seems to be a void when a business leaves our neighborhood, especially one that meets the needs of our residents. The banks in Madison Park have increasingly supported our community and have tried hard to be sensitive and support both the businesses and residents who live here."

What happens to the Tully's space has been a matter of intense speculation by many Madison Parkers over the past five months. In fact, a commercial broker tells us that in his long career he's never seen such a high level of interest by any other neighborhood in what was going to happen to an individual retail space. But the time for speculation is now over. "Confirmed" or not, a bank it is.