Editor’s Note: While any place of quality is welcome in the Ballard hub, we have a soft spot for any business that finds a way to authentically integrate itself within the culture. The Noble Fir is a fine example of thinking locally. It is a tavern with an eye, a mind, and a heart, to being part of the community. You’re looking for something unique and refreshing? You want to feel like you’re really still in Ballard? Then visit The Noble Fir.
Maybe a place like The Noble Fir would have seemed just a bit too luxurious in the past. Maybe. But then again, Seattle has maintained a long love affair with microbrewies and can boast at having some of the best in the world.
Why not have that level of excellence, and even elegance, amid the industrial and mechanical fixtures of old Ballard?
What we all wish to avoid is The Planet Hollywood treatment. If a place has no real connection to anywhere, then it contributes to diminishing that place. Not to put down Planet Hollywood but I think you know what I mean. So, yeah, The Noble Fir, and other fine establishments like it, are what we want to see: something that enhances the character of Ballard and actually fits.
These sort of ponderings take time but we have plenty of that. And, once a good mood is set, perhaps with a fine ale, in a good place, we can settle in and find all sorts of stories to tell.
BALLARD COMICS #7
Editor’s Note: Any serious conversation on urban planning will include the thoughts of activist Jane Jacobs. She was a champion of urban spaces at a human scale and of the preservation of older buildings in a community. Just in terms of practicality, it was the older buildings that had intrinsic value. It was their presumably lower rents, that allowed for risk-taking ventures with limited funds.
When is gentrification too much of a good thing? Something to consider as Ballard continues to grow. Will there always be room for those things with the original sense of Ballard?
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