A vote declared the old Denny's a landmark. Here's an architect's idea for the design of the condos that will incorporate the landmark building.
Thursday, February 21, 2008
Design for the New Denny's
A vote declared the old Denny's a landmark. Here's an architect's idea for the design of the condos that will incorporate the landmark building.
Underground Movement to Save Sunset?
I was walking by Smitty's Barbershop on 15th during the eclipse last night and saw a flyer posted on the inside of their door. Other than "Save the Sunset", the only content was an email address...savesunset@yahoo.com. Is this a movement? Is there other information and perhaps a master plan yet to be revealed to those who email? Or are they like us, wondering if someone else has a clear idea for action?
Tell us Ballard, have you heard any rumblings?
Tell us Ballard, have you heard any rumblings?
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
Rock and Roll Weekend in Ballard
This Friday The Cops are playing at the Tractor Tavern. Hot Hot Hot. You should check it out. I guess there are other bands that night too.
THE COPS
THE LOWE BEATS - Nick Lowe cover bands featuring membbers of Young Fresh Fellows, REM, and Tripwires.
THE BELTHOLES
The show is at 9 and costs $7.
Monday, February 18, 2008
President's Day Pub Crawl
Ballard is a pretty good spot for impromptu pub crawls. I dare you to do one today. If you're wondering which Ballard bars have decks or patios for a sunny day like today (or if you're preparing for summer), here's a quick list. Let us know if we've forgotten any.
La Isla - 2320 NW Market St
Hazlewood - 2311 NW Market St
Ray's Cafe - 6049 Seaview Ave NW
Anthony's Homeport - 6135 Seaview Ave NW
King's Hardware - 5225 Ballard Ave
Ballard Loft - 5105 Ballard Ave
Maritime - 1514 NW Leary Way
Mike's Chili - 1447 NW Ballard Way
BalMar - 5449 Ballard Ave NW
La Carta de Oaxaca - 5431 Ballard Ave
Matador - 2221 NW Market St
Molly Maguire's - NW 65th and 6th
La Isla - 2320 NW Market St
Hazlewood - 2311 NW Market St
Ray's Cafe - 6049 Seaview Ave NW
Anthony's Homeport - 6135 Seaview Ave NW
King's Hardware - 5225 Ballard Ave
Ballard Loft - 5105 Ballard Ave
Maritime - 1514 NW Leary Way
Mike's Chili - 1447 NW Ballard Way
BalMar - 5449 Ballard Ave NW
La Carta de Oaxaca - 5431 Ballard Ave
Matador - 2221 NW Market St
Molly Maguire's - NW 65th and 6th
Friday, February 1, 2008
Where in Ballard is Tammy?
Longtime bartending favorite of the Waterwheel; Tammy is no longer working at our favorite watering hole. This Gossip Girl is on a mission to find her heavy pours...a Vodka-Soda reward is in your future if you provide me with her location.
Under The Needle: Working-class tavern goes upscale
This is from today's PI. Ballard is a-changin', and I hate change. :)
With the shift change came the steelworkers, regular as clockwork: The 6 a.m. crowd fresh from the graveyard; the 3 p.m. day shifters; the post-midnight swingers who drank faster than the rest because a 12:30 a.m. arrival meant last call was staged at the back of a bartender's throat.
These waves of workers, mostly from nearby Northwest Steel Rolling Mills, for decades floated Harvey's Tavern in Ballard and helped put John Grant and seven brother and sisters through Seattle Catholic schools.
The Leary Way Northwest tavern had one tap -- it poured Rainier -- four pizza ovens, a dozen-seat horseshoe bar, a handful of wooden benches bracketing tables, a balky, often silent jukebox, a flock of more than 100 Tweety Birds gathered over decades and a no-profanity edict.
In all, 782 square feet and 73 years of inertia.
No moules in the house. No frites to be found. Not yet, anyway.
"We did good," said John Grant, now 42. He was 10 when his parents bought Harvey's in 1974, then began working there as an adult. "It was a good living. Not rich, but we did OK."
But the mill went to two shifts, changed owners, then one shift, then none, then closed -- torn down and replaced by a Fred Meyer.
And Harvey's, which opened in 1934 and hung on as Ballard seesawed through fishing booms and busts, the rise and decline of heavy industry and the cultural shift from labor to white-collar condo-professionals, finally shut its taps in October.
And those moules? They're musseling in.
"We're pretty excited about the place," said Scott Laney, 31, of Seattle. "We think we'll do well."
Laney, a Honolulu native and University of Washington graduate with a degree in political science, has put his degree to "its best use" as a bartender in town for most of the past 10 years at upscale places such as Serafina and midscale spots such as The Great Nabob.
Laney, riding around town on a borrowed motorcycle a few months ago, saw the for-rent sign in the window of the closed Harvey's. For a year, he'd been thinking about opening his own bar, so he stopped to look.
Two partners and a lease later, he's begun work on "The Traveler." He sees the same 782 square feet as a potential "gastropub," though he hesitates to use the term, thinking it both overly foodie for a cocktail joint and a bit pretentious.
"We want to have good food, mussels, different styles of frites. We'll have a TV on showing the game. We want it to be a neighborhood place, but with a more contemporary feel," he said.
Laney knows he's an agent of change in Seattle, even as he admits to internal conflict over it. "I did go in Harvey's a long time ago. I remember it had a dive-bar character -- something I enjoy -- but that's not going to be my style of bar."
Laney, who hopes to have The Traveler open in April, said he knows how some people lament Seattle's upward mobility, its new pretense. But just as his bar might have failed 30 years ago, staying with a downscale tavern might not be what people want anymore.
"Look around," he said. "What do you see in Ballard?"
Which is a fair point. But for John Grant, that hardly takes the sting away.
Harvey's, he said, still made money and had regulars, but the new landlord wouldn't renew the lease under the old terms. The rent was going up; the town is changing. It took his mom -- who regularly tossed people from the place for swearing -- more than a year for the bitterness to fade.
Sure, Grant said, progress is fine, but what is lost on the march? "The community," he said, "loses a bit of itself."
Harvey's tables, made from fishing-boat hatch covers, now cradle drinks at Jules Maes Saloon in Georgetown. The Harvey's Tavern sign sits in the garage of one of the members of the former house band, John Henry's Hammer -- its namesake, as legend goes, also lost to progress.
With the shift change came the steelworkers, regular as clockwork: The 6 a.m. crowd fresh from the graveyard; the 3 p.m. day shifters; the post-midnight swingers who drank faster than the rest because a 12:30 a.m. arrival meant last call was staged at the back of a bartender's throat.
These waves of workers, mostly from nearby Northwest Steel Rolling Mills, for decades floated Harvey's Tavern in Ballard and helped put John Grant and seven brother and sisters through Seattle Catholic schools.
The Leary Way Northwest tavern had one tap -- it poured Rainier -- four pizza ovens, a dozen-seat horseshoe bar, a handful of wooden benches bracketing tables, a balky, often silent jukebox, a flock of more than 100 Tweety Birds gathered over decades and a no-profanity edict.
In all, 782 square feet and 73 years of inertia.
No moules in the house. No frites to be found. Not yet, anyway.
"We did good," said John Grant, now 42. He was 10 when his parents bought Harvey's in 1974, then began working there as an adult. "It was a good living. Not rich, but we did OK."
But the mill went to two shifts, changed owners, then one shift, then none, then closed -- torn down and replaced by a Fred Meyer.
And Harvey's, which opened in 1934 and hung on as Ballard seesawed through fishing booms and busts, the rise and decline of heavy industry and the cultural shift from labor to white-collar condo-professionals, finally shut its taps in October.
And those moules? They're musseling in.
"We're pretty excited about the place," said Scott Laney, 31, of Seattle. "We think we'll do well."
Laney, a Honolulu native and University of Washington graduate with a degree in political science, has put his degree to "its best use" as a bartender in town for most of the past 10 years at upscale places such as Serafina and midscale spots such as The Great Nabob.
Laney, riding around town on a borrowed motorcycle a few months ago, saw the for-rent sign in the window of the closed Harvey's. For a year, he'd been thinking about opening his own bar, so he stopped to look.
Two partners and a lease later, he's begun work on "The Traveler." He sees the same 782 square feet as a potential "gastropub," though he hesitates to use the term, thinking it both overly foodie for a cocktail joint and a bit pretentious.
"We want to have good food, mussels, different styles of frites. We'll have a TV on showing the game. We want it to be a neighborhood place, but with a more contemporary feel," he said.
Laney knows he's an agent of change in Seattle, even as he admits to internal conflict over it. "I did go in Harvey's a long time ago. I remember it had a dive-bar character -- something I enjoy -- but that's not going to be my style of bar."
Laney, who hopes to have The Traveler open in April, said he knows how some people lament Seattle's upward mobility, its new pretense. But just as his bar might have failed 30 years ago, staying with a downscale tavern might not be what people want anymore.
"Look around," he said. "What do you see in Ballard?"
Which is a fair point. But for John Grant, that hardly takes the sting away.
Harvey's, he said, still made money and had regulars, but the new landlord wouldn't renew the lease under the old terms. The rent was going up; the town is changing. It took his mom -- who regularly tossed people from the place for swearing -- more than a year for the bitterness to fade.
Sure, Grant said, progress is fine, but what is lost on the march? "The community," he said, "loses a bit of itself."
Harvey's tables, made from fishing-boat hatch covers, now cradle drinks at Jules Maes Saloon in Georgetown. The Harvey's Tavern sign sits in the garage of one of the members of the former house band, John Henry's Hammer -- its namesake, as legend goes, also lost to progress.
The Ballard Loft
Last night a fellow Gossiper and I went to check out the Ballard Loft. Neither of us had been there and it was their grand opening. The food was good, and the drinks were decent, but we decided this is King's Junior, and definately a "new" ballard spot. So, I think I will let the influx of eastside-type-new-ballard people have it. I dont mind, the more cheesy places for them, the less they will interfere with the real ballard.
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