HistoryLink Tours

Continue one block east along Spring Street and note the mature urban tree canopy of the neighborhood. Looking east up Spring, one gets a sense of how apartments constructed through the decades have come to characterize the First Hill neighborhood. From the first apartment block built in Seattle in 1901 to the new towers piercing through the tree canopy, First Hill’s diverse collection of multifamily housing contribute to the densest neighborhood in the Northwest. On the southeast corner at Minor Avenue is the San Marco apartments. This lovely and evocative courtyard apartment, built ca. 1900, is a very early multi-family building constructed in what was until then an exclusive single-family enclave. A 1910 census confirms that the San Marco was a family-oriented building, with six couples having one child residing with them. Within the small entry courtyard, three arched entrances lead into the central section and each of the two wings, comprising a total of nineteen units. Designed by Saunders and Lawton, the gabled dormer above the central doorway, with its curvilinear parapet, is typical of the Spanish Mission style. A diamond patterned string course marks the transition between first and second floors and provides market contrast to the rough stucco siding. The restrained scale and massing of the San Marco allowed it to fit seamlessly into the residential streetscape.