Intimate Interiors
The villa’s imposing street presence contrasts with surprisingly comfortable, warmly wood-paneled interiors, designed to maximize views and light.
Engineered for the Slope
The innovative reverse floorplan (with the kitchen facing the street and the living room at the back) suggests Thomas’s interest in site-specific design in the modern sense. The house nestles into the hillside, with choreographically linked points of entry on different levels, and all modern utilities buried below ground. An adjacent 20,000+ SF City of Seattle pedestrian right of way broadens views to the south and west.
Homage to Italy
Enchanted by his visit to the Amalfi coast, Thomas liberally borrowed Italianate elements for the exterior design of his first Seattle commissions, the Chelsea Hotel and the Sorrento hotel. For his own house he took precise inspiration from the villa in Capri where he had stayed, and which he repeatedly painted. Italianate design elements in the Harlan Thomas house include the stucco façade, the square courtyard terrace with pergola, and the large sunset-facing windows.
Beauty Worth Preserving
12” x 12” solid timber ceiling beams hewn from vertical-grained first-growth fir. Siberian white oak floors, quarter-sawn for durability and top-nailed. Ornamented cast iron radiators and porcelain sinks. Bathroom tile surround from the Rookwood Pottery Company in Cincinnati, Ohio, renowned for its ceramic art tile. Decorative fireplace brickwork design by the architect. A lion head fountain spout emblazoned on the facade. An arched window on the landing, to flood the stairs with natural light. Beautifully intact and ready for restoration, to delight the heart of the antiquarian or history buff and provide another 100 years of comfort and inspiration.
Old World Hospitality
Serve an aperitif on the charmingly intimate lower terrace, or cozy up to the terra cotta-tiled brick fireplace as you watch ferries crisscross the Sound and the sun set over the Olympics, through the original six-paned windows. An in-law apartment with its own entrance offers privacy for visiting family or overnight guests.
Circular floor plan
Brickwork fireplace with terra cotta bas-relief tiles
First-growth 12” x 12” timber beams
Siberian white oak floors
Bathroom with Rookwood ceramic tiles
Self-contained in-law or guest apartment
Paved Italianate courtyard terrace
Sweeping views from Alki Beach and Magnolia Bluff to Blue Ridge
