November 14, 2018

Skanska tops out 2+U at 2nd and University

Photo by Benjamin Minnick [enlarge]

Raised office towers will sit above a street level open area with retail, restaurants and bars.

Skanska USA Commercial Development yesterday celebrated topping out for 2+U in downtown Seattle.

The project takes up most of the block bounded by First and Second avenues and University and Seneca streets. Crews are building 2+U next to the Diller Hotel, which sits on the northwest corner of the block.

When it's finished in mid-2019, 2+U will have two connected towers — 19 and 38 stories — set on a series of Y-shaped posts. The design creates open space below the structure for a terraced “urban village” with a landscaped central plaza. The space will have 24,000 square feet of retail, restaurants and bars, and is designed to allow pedestrians to pass through the block from any direction.

There will be up to 85 feet of space below the building on First Avenue, tapering in height to Second Avenue to fit the sloped site.

The legs are made of giant steel pipes clad in precast concrete.

The two towers will have 686,000 square feet of office space and 18,000 square feet of retail. Two concrete elevator cores will support them.

Floor plates range from 18,000 to 30,000 square feet.

Here's the project team: Skanska, general contractor; Pickard Chilton, design architect; Kendall/Heaton Associates, architect of record; Graham Baba Architects, retail designer; Swift Co., landscape architect; and Magnusson Klemencic Associates, structural engineer.