Campus Community

Construction Underway of New 10-Story Dorm & Office Building

Written by Mike Thee

May 15, 2017

mock up building design of new student dorm and office building

The facility is expected to open fall 2018.

Construction has begun on a 10-story building that will have eight floors of housing for junior and senior students and two floors of offices and common spaces. When completed in September 2018, there will be 303 beds for students, large commons areas and consolidated office space for Enrollment Services, including Admissions and Student Financial Services. The new building also will help in the demand for on-campus housing.

Concurrent with construction at 1107 E. Madison St., the university will renovate the ground floor of the adjacent storage building at 1111 E. Madison St., to relocate the Campus Store, which is scheduled to open in its new space next winter.

The two projects provide a unique opportunity to add a welcoming portal to the Seattle U campus at the busy intersection of 12th Avenue and Madison Street in the heart of the bustling Capitol Hill neighborhood.

“We’re pretty excited about revitalizing that corner,” says Robert Schwartz, associate vice president for facilities. “It will be quite transformative when these two buildings are open.”

The university partnered with a private developer, Capstone Development Partners, to finance, design, build, operate and maintain the building. The expectation is that rents will be significantly lower than the market rate for comparable units around Capitol Hill, where non-campus housing costs have risen dramatically in recent years.