Seattle, Washington, USA
The Georgetown Steam Plant was built in 1906 to power Seattle’s streetcar system, and later powered over 10,000 local homes. The 80-foot tall, concrete behemoth was decommissioned in 1977, and left entirely intact; it is the last place in the world where these turn-of-the-century turbines can be seen in their original context.
Georgetown Steam Plant by Signal Architecture + Research, won an American Architecture Award 2025 from The Chicago Athenaeum: Museum of Architecture and Design.
The reason the Steam Plant is located in Georgetown is because the Duwamish River used to run right past it, offering fresh, cool water for use in its condensers. Just seven years after the Plant was completed, the river was straightened and deepened, crowning the destruction brought by colonialism to the valley.
Between 1855 and 1904, 94 traditional Duwamish longhouses were burned to the ground in the region, and it was Seattle co-founder Charles Terry who reportedly led an effort to raze the Duwamish tribe’s ancient village (hah-AH-poos), which was located along the banks of the Duwamish River at what is now known as Airport Way, very close to the Steam Plant. The village dated back to 300 BCE.
This helps frame the importance of the land marked by the Steam Plant. The project was initiated as a means to center a community voice in this historic site and its adjacent, rare undeveloped land marking this time in history and the place the river used to run.
There is a poetics to a place of electric generation becoming a new kind of catalyst; What can the Plant (em)power now? This project requires a timeline reflecting not the speed of fundraising or construction, but the speed of trust; we cannot outpace the community while advocating for them.
Seattle City Light has partnered with the Georgetown Steamplant Community Development Authority, our client, to make this Historic Landmark as safe and accessible as possible and, through community partnership, transform it into a place to gather, learn, dream and celebrate.
The project is a continuing conversation between the building’s structural and historical needs and the community’s needs.
The same layered texture that makes the Plant so attractive, makes the project complex — the Steam Plant is a National Historic Landmark, a National Historic Mechanical Engineering Landmark, a City of Seattle Landmark, and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Each designation comes with rules and protections.
Plus, the thick walls reveal century-old techniques and best practices that aren’t best anymore. Ironically, the plant has very little electricity, no heat (the steam boilers generated plenty to keep the Plant warm), and no working plumbing. The concrete has aged, and though it remains strong, it needs to be reinforced to be resilient to earthquakes and to withstand the next century of musical vibration and gathering.
At 117 years old, the Steam Plant is older than most of us will live to be, so the project is less about ownership, and more about stewardship — setting the Plant up for the next organizers, community members, and local needs.
Architects: Signal Architecture + Research
Design Team: Mark Johnson, Lorine Moellentine, Nikki Watanabe, and Joseph Sadoski
Associate Architect: SHKS Architects
Design Team: David Strauss and Sean Kelly
General Contractor: Sellen Construction Company
Client: Georgetown Steam Plant
Photographs: Courtesy of the Architects
