Vulcan Google campus 1
The latest renderings of one of Google’s future Seattle buildings. Credit: Graphite Design Group

Google’s new Seattle campus — deep in the heart of Amazon country in the South Lake Union neighborhood — will be up for a key approval from the city next week.

The site, known as Block 25W in real estate circles, is up for design review approval Wednesday, where a group of local architects, developers, residents and community representatives will dissect and possibly OK building designs. Vulcan Real Estate, the real estate arm of Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen’s investment firm, is developing the campus. The same company also built Amazon’s campus in the neighborhood before selling it directly to the online retail giant in 2012.

Construction on the campus is set to begin early next year. Credit: Graphite Design Group

googleBlock 25W is on the north side of Mercer Street, between Fairview and Boren avenues north. A 14-story structure will be built on that site with six stories of office space totaling 145,600 square feet for Google and 69 apartments on the upper floors. A second project on the same block, this one called Block 25E, will have another six-story office building for Google. It has already received its design review.

Another pair of Google office buildings with apartments above will be built on the block between Terry Ave N. and Boren Ave. N. That block will have approximately 290,000 square feet of office space and about 80 apartments.

Google Vulcan campus 3

The entire campus in the neighborhood will have more than 600,000 square feet of office space. Construction will take place in phases, beginning in the first quarter of 2017. The combined office-apartment towers could open in the fourth quarter of 2018, with the office building on Block 25E possibly opening in the second quarter of 2019, Vulcan’s Real Estate Investment Strategy Director Lori Mason Curran told GeekWire.

Google has agreed to leases lasting 14 to 16 years, a sign of the company’s long-term commitment to the Seattle region. Combined with Google’s recently expanded offices in Kirkland, Wash., the technology giant will be approaching 1 million square feet in the region with this new space.

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