The Chihuly museum proposal, a safely guarded secret for months now, is finally available to the public (here’s the <a href=”.pdf). As the Seattle Times noted yesterday, the revamped proposal includes partnerships with the Seattle Public Schools, the Pilchuck Glass School, the Pratt Fine Arts Center, and ArtsFund.
Here’s what’s been added to the proposal:
—A $1 million playground on the Seattle Center grounds.
—An eighth-grade arts curriculum with Seattle Public Schools and a free field trip.
—Free admission for Pratt Fine Arts Students and and a week-long art-centric lecture series for students.
—Pilchuck School of Glass students will also get a lecture series.
As far as the general public goes, here’s what the Chihuly museum would provide free of charge: wider sidewalks. Aside from the sidewalk, the entrance to the museum—you know, where they get you to pay—is described as welcoming and the Cafe has “intimate terraces available” for enjoying lunch or a coffee.
- In the fancy rendering, not in the proposal.
Here’s what’s still missing from the Chihuly museum proposal: free public access to the museum. This proposal’s idea of creating open public space is widening a sidewalk. There’s no word in the proposal of the eight-foot, $2 million “art wall” proponents of the project touted in public meetings in March—although it’s represented in renderings.
The proposal also never mentions ticket prices. It does, however, estimate how much the public could potentially save by buying a discounted annual pass (“Have I got a deal for you!”)—$200,000 off a total ticket prices that, again, haven’t been disclosed—and that seniors and children will be eligible for discounts, like for every other activity in the city. The proposal estimates public savings without giving us a price of entry.
Instead of dwelling on entry fees, the proposal ballyhoos the money a museum would make for the city—and clearly it will make money—at least $350,000 annually in rent. The proposal also estimates $561,000 collected in taxes for the city annually, but this number is based primarily on ticket sales—if they don’t sell tickets, the city doesn’t collect taxes.
The Seattle Center states on its website that the proposals will be evaluated on “a proponent’s demonstrated ability to fund, implement and operate the proposal.” There is a clear advantage for the Chihuly museum proposal, in that it is privately backed and financed. The Chihuly proposal states that all upgrades to the arcade pavilion will be privately funded at no cost to the city—no cost, that is, until Seattle residents actually want to get into the museum. However, what’s just as important to consider in this process is what kind of audiences these proposals draw—and this is a harder factor to quantify.
The Chihuly museum proposal notes that its partner, the Space Needle, “has been a significant attraction and tourism driver for greater than 48 years.” It also estimates this new project will bring 400,000 tourists to the Seattle Center (without explaining how that estimate was derived). This is the meat of their proposal—it’s exciting for tourists. But for most Seattle residents, this proposal is still nothing more than a static collection of glass shielded from view by a stupidly expensive eight-foot-tall wall.
What’s missing from the Chihulhy proposal?
Everything that Seattle citizens want.
Other than that, it’s a great idea for Billionaires who don’t even live in Seattle and want to use our taxpayer-financed public parks for their own private profit …
Ugh, Chihuly. I hate that guy and the snobby baggage of people that comes with trying to view his art. Why don’t they just move this thing over to the Eastside since that’s really where all the pretentious people that are into this shit live anyway. Leave the Seattle Center alone and let KEXP build new offices and an amphitheatre, Seattle Center needs a better stage area anyway. Plus, more of Seattle’s youth population would benefit and have better access to music education activities than glass.
yeah, KEXP’s other projects have been so successful – the hundreds of thousands they spent on that signal rebroadcast in Tacoma – FAIL. Their New York station – FAIL. Now they want to sell commercial ads on their website and try to raise hundreds of thousands more for their radio station to have offices on Seattle Center grounds. FAIL. They don’t have the money and they won’t get it.
This is such bullshit.
If they are estimating $561,000 per year in sales tax revenue to the city, that means they are estimating roughly $6 million per year in sales of tickets and other products. Seriously? Did they just pull that number out of their ass?
And 400,000 new tourists a year to Seattle Center? For real? Are you on crack?
I’ve got news for you, Chihuly fans. The Space Needle has been the defining architectural landmark of Seattle for nearly a half century now. It is immediately recognizable throughout the world. Every single movie or TV show about Seattle must show the Space Needle in at least one shot, or nobody would know its Seattle.
I’m sure that a Chihuly museum would have some draw. I’m not a fan, but he has a following, obviously. But 400,000 tourists a year? $6 million a year in sales? That is some serious wishful thinking.
Seattle would be better off not looking at how much profit something on this site would make, but how much real public benefit would come from it. I’d much rather have something that everyone enjoys but doesn’t raise a single penny in profit than to give over another piece of public land for a private profit business.
If the Chihuly museum has such profit potential, then it is surely viable enough to not need public land. A swingset or basketball court won’t earn any revenue but kids will enjoy it a lot more and it’s a lot less likely to come about on private land.
Keep the private for profit businesses on private land and keep the public interest on our public land.
@4 – it’s actually not bullshit.
400,000 people per year is right in line with what Chihuly exhibits average around the world. It’s also less than what the EMp attracts on average over the last 10 years.
I’ve heard tickets will be $14. Maybe they’ll be $15.
at $15, 400,000 tickets equals $6,000,000 in annual revenue. 5% admissions tax equals $300,000, 10% sales tax equals another $600,000. Not sure how they are getting only $561,000, but it’s easy enough to get at least that number. Maybe they are thinking they don’t pay sales tax on tickets and do it only on merch. if visitors spend an average of $4 each on merch, a pretty safe estimate, then that’s $160,000 in sales tax on merch, so with admissions tax that’s $460,000. Add to that B&O taxes, etc. Adds up quickly.
I’ve heard the rent is $500,000 per year, but $350,000 isn’t peanuts either. All said, over $1 million per year created in direct revenue to the city and state.
#6 – I think it’s disengenuous to compare Chihuly exhibits with a year-round static display showcase.
An exhibit, by its very nature, is transitory and folks know that, if they want to see it, they have to make a special effort to attend the exhibit before it packs up and leaves their city. This is in no way comparable to a permanent glass showplace nestled under the Needle.
In other words, “No” to the vanity glass museum. I support using the land at Seattle Center for something that would not only bring in the tourists, but also have definable, concrete benefit for the people of this city. The vanity glass ‘museum’ does not qualify.
“This proposal’s idea of creating open public space is widening a sidewalk.”
Cienna mentions the $1 million playground, but fails to point out that its footprint is as big as the whole Chihuly project. The FREE playground would hire artists, be attractive to kids and families, and oh yeah, it’s green space. None of the other proposals come close to this.
FROG’s proposal shows example gardens that are (guess what?) privately maintained. It’s also ironic to me that FROG’s Rev. Sandy Brown is advocating green space when her big new First Church (you can’t miss it-it’s uglier than the EMP) on nearby Denny has ZERO green space. How convenient on her part to expect the public to fund green space to make her nearby environs more attractive.
Seriously, it’s like they don’t get the concept that if they keep pushing this there’s going to be lots of teens with bats and skateboards lobbing pile drives into the “Museum”.
Great piece Ceinna.
Who gets the final say on this? Voters? Counsel? Paul Allen?
@8 Sandy Brown is a “he.”
Why is no one at the Stranger talking about the close relationship between Sandy Brown, Sally Bagshaw and David Brewster? Hey, aren’t your reporters cozy with the Bagshaw office staff too? So busy bashing Chihuly, you’ve missed the real story – or maybe just avoided it.
You know what else is missing from this proposal? A unicorn petting zoo.
I used to have an annual pass to Disneyland. Why the fuck would anyone want an annual pass to a fucking glass museum?
Oh look, it’s Meinert, shill for the crap museum.
I don’t know anyone that thinks the Seattle Center is a public park. It is an event center featuring all kinds of cultural events – most of them charge admission. Remember when Bumbershoot was free? Do you see tourists wandering around Denny Park looking at the trees? No way, they head to Mt. Rainier for that. Get real. This would an asset for Seattle. PolPot is just negative person squeaking in the corner.
What has a negative idiot like WILL IN SEATTLE done for this community? Give me a list of your accomplishments. Still in your mom’s basement?
Gee 14, that’s a dumb question. Why would anyone want season tickets to the Mariners, Children’s Theater or Symphony? Gee, why would they???
Cienna, considering the proposals were just received by Seattle Center on June 4th, how is it that this has been a “safely guarded secret for months now”? Your article is a perfect example of advocacy journalism – which to me is not journalism at all. Why don’t you tell the whole story?
Um, that’s because you probably don’t live IN Seattle, you unmitigated troll. Get your ass off the couch some weekend, hop on 520 and drive from your Sammamish plateau suburb to the Center sometime – this weekend would be a perfect opportunity. When you get there, look around at the families strolling through the grounds, the teens hanging out in the food court, the little kids splashing in the fountain, the hippies playing drums or guitars or hackey-sack on the lawn. Just sit for an hour and watch the ever-changing parade of Seattle citizenry using the public spaces for nothing more than their own enjoyment for their own sake.
Unlike YOU, not everyone who visits the Center passes from a parking garage to McCall Hall or the Bagley Wright.
But, if you actually LIVED here, you’d know that already…
And the answer to YOUR inane response is: “Because, unlike this immutable, static display of largely undifferentiated glass blobs, these venues actually offer events that change on a regular basis, which means a season pass gets you a multiplicity of experiences, which is very different from paying for the opportunity to see the same thing over and over again.
You know, even for a troll with a blatant self-interest in this, you have got to be one of the most transparently obvious shills I’ve ever read on SLOG. If your PR/Marketing skills are on the same level as your pathetic attempts at sockpuppetry, it’s no wonder the Wrights felt it necessary to toss in a $2 mm “deal sweetener”.
In other words, keep it up Wanda: you’re doing a terrific job convincing the rest of us just how awful this proposal really is.
You’re all trolls on this bus. Free speech – except when you don’t agree with a few dweebs. Ha! A shill if you disagree with the alternative press. Dear Stranger, there’s no Pulitzer Prize in this story.
Comte – your illustrating exactly why narrow mind idiots rule in Seattle. Did you oppose the SAM sculpture park too? They need 24-hour security because people like you have to destroy things. Try doing some good for a change.
21: A shill if you disagree with the alternative press.
You could be a shill. You could be a Wright, for all we know. But I love how the Chihuly-haters here know that you’re a shill, or that anyone who favors the proposal is a shill. In their narrow view of things, it’s simply not possible for anyone who’s not on the Chihuly-Wright payroll to be in favor of it.
Yeah, I’m going to feel all hurt and whatever by snark coming from an anonymous troll. Look me up, baby – I’m one of the handful of people on these Interwebs who doesn’t hide behind a “handle”. I’m about as unanonymous as one can be in this medium – and it’ll take you about three clicks to find out that I’ve actually received awards for “the good I do”, which I’ll bet good money is more than you can say for yourself.
And for the record, please cite where I said you don’t have the right to BE a shill; but please, don’t for a New York second think you’re fooling anyone here. You’re not.
Also, the SAM sculpture park doesn’t cost $14 a pop to walk through, now does it? The works are sited on public land that isn’t restricted, now is it?
And it’s “you’re” not “your”.
Seriously, you really aren’t very good at this, you know (because WE all certainly do). Still, thanks for playing; we’ll send you the home version of the game.
@23:
We KNOW Meinert, who’s decidedly pro-Chihuly. But at least he’s got the balls to stand behind his own opinions, unlike you cowards. If you and Wanda AREN’T shills, all you have to do is prove it by coming out from behind your mask.
But you won’t. You can’t. You’d prove me right if you did.
So where’s the pdf of the proposal? The link is broken.
@24: Wanda Fooka is probably a shill. Her account is new and she only comments on Chihuly posts.
Roma is probably not a shill. I remember him posting long before there were regular posts about Chihuly and he posts pretty regularly about other topics.
@23: We KNOW Meinert, who’s decidedly pro-Chihuly. But at least he’s got the balls to stand behind his own opinions, unlike you cowards. If you and Wanda AREN’T shills, all you have to do is prove it by coming out from behind your mask.
COMTE, you’re just proving my point about the narrow view and assumptions of Chihuly-haters…or at least you.
You want “proof”? If you took the time to read what I’ve already written about the Chihuly proposal, you’d have your “proof.” But I guess it’s a lot easier to just resort to simplistic name-calling than spend a few minutes doing some research, isn’t it?
I’ve made numerous posts about the Chihuly proposal and I’ve said it’s not my preference. The other day I listed the nine proposals and I put it at #5, after the three open space proposals and the KEXP proposal. I also don’t like the way the Chihuly plan originally seemed be a done deal with the Seattle Center folks not being open to other plans. It’s just that I don’t hate Chihuly or his glass like many of the critics seem to and I’m also not as rabidly opposed to the idea as the critics are.
Where we differ is that I believe people who are not on the Chihuly-Wright payroll can actually be in favor of the Chihuly proposal. You, apparently, do not. I don’t expect everyone to agree with me on issues I feel passionately about. You strike me as the kind of person who does.
@27:
Lovely. You put words “in my mouth” I’ve never stated, but have the hubris to suggest your opinion on the subject has any more weight than the wind. So long as you hide behind your cloak of anonymity, your words are meaningless.
If you truly had the “passion” you claim, you wouldn’t need to hide. Meinert, for as much as I disagree with him, doesn’t need to hide, and for that he has my respect. If you want your opinion to be respected, then all you have to do is own it.
Until then, it really doesn’t matter if you’re a shill or not.
Then either you haven’t left the house in forty years, or you live nowhere near Seattle. Either way, you’ve disqualified yourself from this discussion.
The Seattle Center is an urban park, but not like Discovery Park with the trees, foliage and views of the mountains. All the nay sayers are anti-art, anti-glass art and mostly anti-Chihuly. Wow, what a cause to rally for. What is your great proposal and who will pay for it?
COMTE, around the time I first began posting on the internet, I had just finished reading a book on the JFK asassination. The author had a very interesting theory: that Oswald had been firing and shot Kennedy but that the fatal head shot had been a tragic accident, caused by a Secret Service agent in the followup car who had an AR-15 rifle. The coverup of a tragic accident, especially one involving a Secret Service agent, seemed far more plausible to me than any of the numerous conspiracy theories so I searched the internet looking for a discussion board to see what other people thought about this. I found a board on the old Usenet (perhaps Usenet still exists…I don’t know) and there was a very spirited discussion/debate going on. Most of the people there believed in some kind of conspiracy theory, while a minority argued that Oswald was solely responsible.
What I found fascinating was that the conspiracy folks were absolutely convinced that all these people who disagreed with them had some connection to “the coverup.” They simply could not accept that there were other ordinary citizens who had a different opinion than they did.
You remind me of those conspiracy people.
“it really doesn’t matter if you’re a shill or not.”
What part of “I’ve made numerous posts about the Chihuly proposal and I’ve said it’s not my preference.” were you unable to comprehend?
30/Wanda: All the nay sayers are anti-art, anti-glass art and mostly anti-Chihuly.
From the comments I’ve read, it’s mostly anti-Chihuly. But just because someone hates Chihuly or his glass, doesn’t mean they’re anti-art. A person can hate Kanye West but love music.
My understanding is that the Chihuly museum was initially presented as a fait accompli, and it’s understandable that many people would be irked at that.
I just finished reading a March article in the Seattle Times where Sally Bagshaw is quoted as saying, “My hope and dream would be to make the Seattle Center Seattle’s ‘Central Park,’ and the more green space we give away, the less we’re going to have a Central Park.” I agree with her and my preference at that south Fun Forest site would be an open space, one that’s creatively designed (which is, of course, asking a lot of Seattle.) Furthermore I share her dream of making Seattle Center our “Central Park” but the fact is that no matter how many parcels of open space there are at Seattle Center, it will never even be close to Central Park, which is a truly wonderful urban park, designed by Frederick Law Olmstead. Just look at this gorgeous scene. Anything remotely like it at Seattle Center? Nope. Will there ever be? Nope. (Anything remotely like it in any Seattle park? Nope.)
Wow, Roma. Now, you’re comparing me to wacko JFK assassination conspiracy theorists on Usenet? That’s just, well, pathetic is the only word that comes immediately to mind.
Seriously, what ossified elephant’s graveyard of personal disparagements did you have to scrape THAT one out of? Don Rickles’ grandfather would have been embarrassed to use it. For one thing, there are so many stylistic and structural problems with it one barely knows where to begin.
First off, it’s waaaaay too long. If you’re going to attack someone’s character – ATTACK. Don’t go off on some rambling, geezerly, “well, when I was a boy back in the day” introduction: aim for the target. “Your mother wears army boots” may be a lame insult, but at least it has the virtue of being pithy.
Also, if you’re going to attempt to use topical references, it’s best to try for something that’s actually CURRENT, like, for example, “You’re mamma’s got more liquor in her than Lindsay Lohen’s ankle bracelet”. See, people GET that, because it references a recent occurrence, with which everyone will be familiar. When you dredge up obscure, nay, veritably ancient references, such as the ones you’ve used, you greatly diminish the effect of your attack. Frankly, you might as well be hurling petrified balls of dinosaur dung at the bones of long-dead Australopithecines for all the effect it will have.
(And FYI, Usenet is still very much alive, although certainly nowhere near as popular as it was back in the early ’90’s. You need client software and access to a news server to get in, but those are readily available. Try Googling “Usenet newsreader software” for starters.)
Which brings me to another point: if the person you’re attempting to insult has to explain aspects of the insult, not only to casual observers (as many here have probably never heard of Usenet, and in quite a number of cases, probably weren’t even born when it came into existence), but to the insulter as well, you’ve just plain lost whatever impact the insult was intended to produce in the first place. I mean, how am I supposed to feel angry or hurt or demeaned when I know more about the references you’re using than you do?
So, let’s review what we’ve learned here today about the proper way to throw verbal vitriol:
1. Focus on the target
2. Keep it short
3. Keep it fresh
4. Do the research
Hopefully, these tips will enable you to improve your insults in the future. Feel free to try out some new ones on me when you think you’ve got the hang of it. I’ll be more than happy to provide you with constructive feedback.
Wow, Roma. Now, you’re comparing me to wacko JFK assassination conspiracy theorists on Usenet?
Sure am. They were always demanding that the Oswald-did-it-alone believers were “hiding” the fact that they were really part of the “conspiracy coverup” and were just on the forum to belittle their precious theories.
In the same way, you’re accusing people who don’t see things exactly your way vis-a-vis the Chihuly proposal of “hiding” and demanding: “[come] out from behind your mask.”
Since you spent your entire last post blathering and never answered my What part of “I’ve made numerous posts about the Chihuly proposal and I’ve said it’s not my preference.” were you unable to comprehend? question, let me attempt to explain it to you one more time in the hope it will finally sink in.
. I don’t hate Chihuly or his work. That doesn’t mean I’m in favor of the museum at Seattle Center. I’m not. On the other hand, should the review committee decide to select it, I’m not going to feel that it’s the end of the world.
. Of the nine current proposals, I ranked the Chihuly proposal at #5, after the three open-space proposals and the KEXP proposal (and I mentioned that in a post above.) A person who is intelligent and reasonable would know that just because a person doesn’t put something last on their list, it doesn’t logically follow that it’s first on their list.
I suspect you’re not this way in all areas of your life — you might be a very cool person — but here, regarding this topic, you’re acting very immature.
LOL! Right, now you’re going to lecture me on which of us is more mature?
Maturity means taking responsibility for your words and actions, which I’m doing. Remember, Ace: I’m NOT the one hiding behind an anonymous handle here…
I was sorely tempted to get a giant black marker and write NO CHIHULHY on the Seattle Center banner I saw on Saturday that said “Help plan the future of Seattle Center” …