“New Buildings, Bridges, etc… in the Spokane Area rich in Masonry Applications”
By Sunrise Inc.
The Fountain Cafe @Riverfront Park
The Riverfront Park Rotary Fountain is located on Howard Street at the South entrance to Riverfront Park. It is a popular attraction for beating the Summer heat. Kids love it! Dedicated on September 1, 2005 to “the people of Spokane” and under the care of the Spokane Parks Department, the fountain is destined to be a popular attraction for many years to come. The Downtown Spokane Rotary Club 21 and the Spokane Parks Department worked together to make the fountain a reality. Financial support was also provided by numerous donors whose names appear around the fountain. Harold Balazs is the artist.The fountain has five stainless steel columns that are 24 feet tall. These support a 30 foot diameter ring containing 40 overhead jets. The jets spray towards the middle of the fountain producing a dome of water and a waterfall in the fountain’s center. Eight geysers shoot water upwards. The fountain also has dozens of mist jets, and the five boulders have jets that spray sideways. To conserve water, the fountain water is filtered and recirculated.
Kendall Yards includes a comprehensive park and open space plan which draws north-south pedestrian connections from the 1986 West Central Neighborhood Plan. These connections at Cochrane and Chestnut with additional connections reconnect the historic neighborhood to the Great Spokane River Gorge and Centennial Trail. These ‘greenways’ intersect Kendall Yards Boulevard and the Centennial Trail as network for community gathering and neighborhood place making.The Summit Parkway and Kendall Yards’ greenways are a network of parks, open space and protected lands that will be managed for multiple uses including: nature protection, biodiversity management, water resources, recreation, and cultural/historic landscape protection. Greenway systems, such as that proposed for the Kendall Yards include Great Spokane River Gorge Park and Centennial Trail linear corridor, Cedar Plaza and Olmsted Brothers Green set in a new residential and mixed-use neighborhood. The parks, Centennial Trail and open space physically and functionally connect with the West Central neighborhood and Kendall Yards to a historic natural landscape, the rest of Spokane and the region.Today, the historic railroad site is clean, and new residential and commercial development is underway. The design is sensitive to the adjacent historic West central Neighborhood offering a range of housing styles, size and costs to assure socioeconomic and physical integration. Kendall Yards also takes advantage of the historic Spokane River Gorge landscape by extending the Centennial Trail and providing public access along the Spokane River and Gorge edge.
Spokane Arena est 1995
The arena has a state-of-the-art audio and video system. It consists of a 15-by-20-foot (4.6 by 6.1 m) Viacom Sports 12 mm LED display, which is capable of being used as two separate units. The video board has exceptional color reproduction and the best off-angle viewing available for any LED format. It can even be moved forward approximately 100 feet (30 m) and down to approximately 20 feet (6.1 m) off the arena floor. The arena also features a 350° color LED ribbon board, which is mounted on the fascia of the Spokane Arena bowl. It is capable of displaying text messages, animations, logos, scores and statistics.Powered by Crown Amplifiers, the audio system is driven by Community RS880 speakers in the Arena bowl, Altec Lansing satellite speakers for the upper seating areas, and Bose speakers serve the concourse, dressing rooms, and backstage hallways.Large public areas are one of the greater features of the Spokane Arena. The arena floor is 32,000 square feet (2,970 m2), and the 14-foot (4.3 m) high concourse is a spacious 35,000 square feet (3,250 m2). 16 luxury suites contain a total of 146 seats. In addition, there are six meeting rooms located at the Spokane Arena, totalling 10,050 square feet (930 m2) of meeting space.On the Events Level, there are five truck docks with 8-foot (2.4 m) x 10-foot (3.0 m) loading doors, one 8-foot (2.4 m) x 10-foot (3.0 m) drive-in door, and one 20-foot (6.1 m) x 24-foot (7.3 m) drive-in loading door, allowing large shows to load and unload eight trucks simultaneously. Trucks can load and unload unobstructed, directly into the marshalling area at the arena floor’s west end. Backstage are three star dressing rooms, two promoter offices (located in the marshalling area), and seven team dressing rooms, as well as a dressing room for officials.The elevation at street level is approximately 1,900 feet (580 m) above sea level.
RiverPark Square est. 1999
The original River Park Square was opened in 1974. In 1978, an expansion added a 55,000 square-foot enclosed second level and two skywalks connecting the mall to the JCPenney and Nordstrom stores.When completed, the shopping center contained 800,000 square-feet of retail space with The Crescent, JCPenney, and Nordstrom as anchor stores. In February 1984, a new skywalk was constructed to connect the center to The Bon Marché, which was located east of the complex. The addition of the skywalk added 20,000 square-foot of retail space to the center.In January 1987, Osco Drug closed its drug store at the shopping mall.The drug store, which previously operated as PayLess Drug and Skaggs, had been located in downtown Spokane since 1942. The space was quickly replaced by Thrifty Drug in November 1987.In April 1994, PayLess Drug, which acquired the pharmacy from Thrifty, closed for good.In 1991, JCPenney closed its store at River Park Square after relocating to the newly renovated NorthTown Mall. Burlington Coat Factory moved into the space in 1994 and remained at the mall until moving to a larger location in 2001.In April 1992, the shopping mall suffered a big loss when Frederick & Nelson, which acquired The Crescent in 1988, liquidated and closed its remaining stores.In 1995, the Spokane City Council announced that it would seek a $23.8 million federal loan to build a larger Nordstrom store in an attempt bring shoppers back to the ailing shopping center.On February 12, 1998, Nordstrom signed a 20-year lease on a new building at River Park Square Construction began in April 1998.The old Nordstrom building was demolished shortly after for new retail space.The redeveloped $110 million shopping center opened on August 20, 1999 to a crowd of about 2,000 people.In spring 2016, Macy’s closed its doors. The old Macy’s is now being converted into luxury apartments.
IBM Buildings est 1965.
Two of the most unique examples of mid-century modern architecture in Spokane, the IBM buildings on the South Hill feature walls clad in basalt rubble contrasted with large windows and poured concrete. Constructed in 1965 and 1979, these two buildings are some of the most recent to utilize native stone as a part of architectural design. The curved lines of the building are characteristic of the Neo-Expressionist style while the heavy appearance and the use of concrete in a geometric pattern can be categorized as Brutalist features. This unique basalt building is one of the most noticeable uses of native stone in Spokane.
America West Bank Building est.2005
The American West Bank Building, designed by Steven A. Meek Architects, uses classic masonry to complement the historic downtown Spokane environment.
Intricate brickwork creates a rich texture in the 56,000-square-foot building. The five-story building features a rounded tower on a diagonal orientation. A base of beige and cream colored brick anchors the foundation. The main body is constructed of red brick and features ribbon bay windows. Arched windows on the fourth level are accented with beige brick lentils. Above the fifth story, a stone cornice crowns the building, creating a legacy building for the owner and the city.
St. Joseph’s Church & Cemetery Stonework Shrine est.1950
Among the earliest signs of white settlement in the Spokane Valley was the construction of churches and cemeteries, and St Joseph’s Church & Cemetery is the earliest in the Spokane Valley. The original structure was built in 1892 by Catholic settlers, but the cemetery had been in use for years before hand. St. Joseph’s greeted early settlers as they arrived in the valley.For several decades the church did not have a regular parish priest as the location was too remote and the congregation too few. But by the early 1920s the Valley’s population had grown considerably, and the first permanent priest was assigned to the location. An extensive fire completely destroyed the old church in 1928, but it was faithfully reconstructed the following year. The newly reconstructed building was maintained and occupied by the steadily expanding parish for much of the remaining century. By 1992 a need for a larger church drove the parish to construct a modern and larger church in nearby Otis Orchards.Nowadays the church and cemetery are maintained as funeral chapel. The grounds are carefully maintained to reflect the extensive landscaping work that was set up by the original parish. In addition to the picturesque grounds there is a extraordinary monument to St. Joseph on the hill behind. Stonework stairs lead to the shrine, which was hand built by parishioner Henry Arbes in the mid 1950s. It depicts the church’s namesake as well as an outdoor Stations of the Cross and gives visitors spectacular views of the valley and church grounds below.
