The Madison Valley building that was once the home of the wonderful Izilla toys, and more recently was painted purple to house the infamous Lavender Spa and Den of Iniquity, is up for rent. Although the new tenant will need to build upon the recent scandal and overwhelming purpleness of the building, barring any possibility of Prince moving in, what kind-of business should we wish for?
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My wishlist includes:
- good Indian restaurant
- good Pho restaurant
- Twilight Exit-style bar
- Record store that sells funky stuff on vinyl (it’d make sense with the building!)
Post your ideas / comments below!
You can begin with a new paint job.
I’ll second the good Indian restaurant… Pho we can get by going south to Beacon or west to the ID. Indian is more of a schlep.
You need another store that sells lamp shades. Maybe call it Shady Lamp Jobs
True that!
Actually, I was thinking that “The Lamp Shade” would make for an excellent name for a dive-bar at this location.
Retrofit on 12th does custom lamp shades w/all sorts of patterns and styles. I got an awesome one for my antique lamp. Not necessarily cheap – 50-80 bucks – but totally worth it.
Or maybe “The 10 dollar lamp shade.” It can be a locals-only joke.
“The $10” would be another great bar name for this location . . .
Or “The Extra 10”
hahaha
I’ve been wanting a book store closeby that maybe specializes in kids and kid’s related books. That would be nice…
Also
JUST FYI – I lived in Mad Valley and now live in Madrona and India Express delivers to BOTH! Not that an Indian Restaurant wouldn’t be fantastic – but delivery is pretty fantastic.
http://www.indiaexp.com/
and yes – Paint Job is totally necessary. Luckily I think Izilla functioned there so wonderfully for such a long time that the space won’t be “tainted” for long.
“The $10 Job”
Speaking of Izilla, if you haven’t been to their newer location on 12th…they have expanded out to include a large book section for infants and kids.
It may not be popular with all who frequent this part of Mad Val, but I would love a McMenamin’s-style pub for this location. Obvs. the building would need to be painted, but the home floor plan would fit with McMenamin’s style at a lot of their small pubs in the Portland area, and on summer nights, outdoor seating in the front yard area would be great. We could really use a “cheap-and-cheerful” option along this street (for those of us who can’t alternate Rovers-Harvest Vine-Voila-Chinoise every day of the week.)
That’d be great. Part of the appeal of an Indian or Pho place also would be cheap eats. But, a McMenamin’s pub would be great too–definitely with summer outdoor seating.
Realistically, that building is so small, I don’t know that one could fit a decent kitchen in there. I know the kitchen is small at the Attic–maybe a pub kitchen would work.
I didn’t know that India Express delivers–definitely will try that. I didn’t realize they were getting such decent reviews on Yelp, too:
http://www.yelp.com/biz/india-express-seattle
if its a book store we can just call it Happy Endings!
I think a bar would be great, too. The Hopvine up on 15th also puts out good food with a really small kitchen.