The garish sign for ING Direct on the southern end of the viaduct foreshadows what could happen, as just a couple such signs on our taller buildings would dramatically alter our skyline.

Key Arena; what about the neon sign the city approved for that location?

I don't like the idea, but I would be OK with hanging ads along the walls of the deep bore tunnel. Considering that the walls would be somewhat indoors, and it is projected that only 40,000 vehicles per day will succomb to the underground orifice, not many would have to look at the tacky displays, only those suckers willing to pay $5 for the toll each way.

After reading and rereading this, I still can't really tell if Knute is for or against the Russell Investments sign. The article reads as a sort of lament about Seattle being beautiful while also being commercial and "for sale." Both things are true, but is Knute for or against the sign? If he is against the sign ordinance change, as he hints, why would he have been in favor of the Chihuly Monument, which is also sale of a public asset for commercial gain? I'm confused.

Implicit in this argument is the assumption that the city government should have the right to regulate what private building owners display on their own property. Even if we take it as a given that property rights are close to nonexistent in liberal Seattle, do we really want committees of appointed esthetic moderators to determine what our city should look like?

jml, yes. The alternative is non-appointed corporate esthetic moderators. Runaway government is not the problem, runaway corporatism is.

btw the spelling 'esthetic' comes up as an error in crosscut's spell check. I found this comment on the interwebs, and found it funny:

"In American English, if you wrote "aesthetic" I would assume you were either:

1. Foreign educated
2. A pretentious buttock

It would seem very much like you were "putting on airs".

(Other American English writers may not agree with this assessment.)"

RevSandy: I am opposed to changing the ordinance to allow big corporate logos on skyscrapers and critical of the way it wound up on the agenda: as a favor to one company. I think the skyline is distinct from, say individual streetscapes, as outlined above.

On Seattle Center, I disliked and criticized the way the Chihuly proposal was developed and introduced, and the way it contradicts the conclusion of the Center's own visioning process. I think it was right to go back and get proposals and have much more public debate. I think more open space (to a degree) is fine and can still be achieved, but I disagree with the notion of turning much of the Center into a Central Park. My choice would have been to see a more modern, more cutting edge Fun Forest-type attraction (I'm happy a ferris wheel is coming for the 50th anniversary). I argue that while the Chihuly project isn't my ideal at all, it is fully appropriate to the history of the Center as a multi-purpose arts-entertainment-public-private zone and as a profit-making enterprise. It's a world's fair site, a place for culture and salesmanship, high and low. I'd like to see it maybe a bit more Epcot-ish, but Seattleites rejected Disneyfication back during the Royer years.

jml: Yes, I do want such committees, and we already have them (design review, landmarks, city council, comp and neighborhood plans). It's also why we have zoning. The argument for cultural, historic and aesthetic considerations, for shaping cities by forces other than "the market", is decided. The issue is the matter of degree, and we might differ on that.

"May be" "a city of braggarts and salesman" ? Bill Spiedel on line 2, Knute.

Growing up in Bremerton, it was a thrill to look at the skyline at night as we entered or left on ferry (the Kalakala, if I was lucky). Bright lights, big city. Seattle City Light was beautifully spelled out once a minute atop their HQ, the PI globe was visible at their original place, and Ivar had a dynamic neon sculpture for a sign on his place on the pier. The skyline itself was much closer to the streets than it is today.
Architects may dislike their creations being topped with what they'd compare to costume jewelry, but some of us feel the mountains are not enhanced with a foreground of glass boxes, either. Carbon neutrality and astronomer's whiteout, those are real concerns, but on esthetics give me brash any day of the week. And the orange & yellow Needle too.

I remember visiting Vancouver, B.C. in the 60's and the neon signage on Granville was simply amazing. It all got torn down in the name of urban renewal or some such pretense.

"Oh, look Toto! It's the Emerald City!"

Knute, please stop projecting your fetishization of Seattle on everything. Not a one of downtown's skyscrapers were designed or built with any thought given to anything but the building itself. Seattle's skyline is made up of buildings that resulted from COMMERCIALISM, pure and simple. Take away the mountains and the water, and downtown Seattle's skyline isn't a whole lot different than Houston's or Denver's. Or even Charlotte's...

What settles it for me is imagining the tens of thousands of skyline postcards that in coming years will be sent everywhere with "Russell Investments" lit up right in the middle.
Dick Lilly

Hey, I'm a socialist, but have no problem with signs identifying who owns and occupies various buildings. After all, they are the economy and much of our society. Why shouldnt high rise as well as low rise businesses get to proclaim their wares? Besides it would be informative to know which outfit is where. Dick M

I realize we do have such committes now. In my view it is the reason why our neighborhoods are turning into identical blocks of boring condominium buildings. When I see a city skyline filled with advertising signs I see evidence of bustling economic activity. I think such activity would be welcome in this time of high office vacancy rates downtown.

I would have to assume that no rational developer would cover the view windows in his building with a sign. So the signs are going to be caps to the buildings, right? in place of (or incorporated into) the pyramids, barrel vaults, gables, etc. that architects and their clients top tall buildings with. The sizes that are mentioned in newspaper stories are modest, around 1100 sq. ft. (about 35 feet square) as a maximum. Most tall buildings in Seattle, at least of recent vintage, are near 100 feet minimum on each side. What used to be WAMU tower must be about 120' X 120' (correct me if I'm wrong) and the sign that is being discussed would very modest in size and effect (until illuminated, of course). I don't think signs of this size really deserve the passions that seem to have been stirred.

What surprises me about this discussion and its media coverage is that no pictures or drawings of what it would or could look like have been published. Did I miss something? I am curious.

King TV said a night or two ago that the signs would be about the size of two parking spaces. For example, a sign 17' x 65' would be about 2% of the height of WaMu Tower -- slightly more than one story high. The representation on TV was poorly shown as about four stories high. An accurate representation would inform this discussion as Keith said. I continue to be puzzled by a city which doesn't want to acknowledge those businesses which bless us with employment and people who contribute to fabric of our city.

Flying a fish from the top of Smith Tower--now there was a businessmen who knew how to thumb his nose, attract attention, and enrich our day. This stuff is so Big Blue and apologists short any ability to make distinctions— between few and many, icons and status. Bottom line: all growth is smart because newcomers will all have means and agree to always take trains, planes and ferries to business, consumption and recreation.

Seems to me it should certainly be possible to be a booster for the local economy without permanently defiling the delicate crystals of skyscrapers growing amidst the skyline.

Back in the 1950s California car cultists, who I fiercely admired at the time (that's how old I am) went to great lengths to remove all emblems, product names, badges and other polished chrome decoration from recently built mass-produced cars. You can still see a few of these at the Greenwood Auto Show. The result was an anonymous car, sometimes very nice looking and always at least a little bit faster than the factory version.

The proponents of the unidentified, signless, buildings do share an aesthetic with these early car tinkerers; they would apparently like the buildings to be (as if) geologically formed parts of our terrain, formed anonymously by the eons. Well, that is a nice aesthetic ideal, sort of spoiled when the lights go on in the late afternoon, but a good thing to aspire to. But it is the anonymous part that we will get, not the geological formations, a bland plaid of aluminum, glass and bits of stone. I don't think the signs would be harmful.

Imagine the skyline as it is now: the buildings, Rainier, the water...now add signs...what changed?
When you put words on buildings, you engage the talky part of your brain that admen so love. It's like you're at Kerry Park admiring the view, and then several salesmen sidle up and start whispering in your ear: "Invest with Russell...ING Brings the Bling...WAMU--now sleeping with Shamu!" Okay, not wamu, but you get the idea: in Seattle, we can take in the view, step outside the endless ad barrage, and connect with our incredible environment. It's refreshing, and I would hate to lose that.
There's a reason they don't have ads in places of worship. Am I saying that public space is sacred? I know that's sacrilegious in our money-obsessed culture, but yeah--at least some of it should be.

jml, I like your thinking. Keep writing.

I love signs. Love reading them, love finding where I am going by using them, love the feeling of a downtown being alive at 3:00 am. Love them.

How would signs on buildings block any views, except possibly for a few rooftop standup sign designs, and the sign becomes an extension of the building. Rather cool.

@garlic_tomorrow,

Downtowns are for business and pleasure, but they are not parks, nor are they typically considered places of worship, unless you worship commerce.

So signs. Yeah. Love 'em, especially when they become cultural icons.

@balticbarb, agree totally. 'I continue to be puzzled by a city which doesn't want to acknowledge those businesses which bless us with employment and people who contribute to fabric of our city.'