eleven50

Seattle’s life sciences market entered a period of significant oversupply as new laboratory buildings delivered into a market where tenants were downsizing, sublease space was abundant, and vacancy reached 21% by 2025. eleven50, built on a steep, freeway-adjacent parcel at Alexandria’s Eastlake Campus, faced a particular design challenge: transform a difficult site into a destination tenants would choose over a crowded field of competing options.

The design transforms a challenging freeway-adjacent site into a thriving workplace through three interrelated principles: human, environmental, and business resilience. Human resilience takes shape as a Pacific Northwest forest at the middle of the building, where interwoven columns evoke Douglas Fir trees and a curved glass enclosure refracts freeway noise into a quiet sky garden. An offset core buffers noise and unlocked expansive, unobstructed tenant floor plates to foster collaboration. Shared ground-floor and rooftop amenities serve both building tenants and the broader community.

The building achieves environmental resilience through triple-pane glazing that mitigates 100-decibel freeway noise while improving thermal performance. A Douglas Fir-inspired façade optimizes views and energy efficiency. Floor-by-floor mechanical systems reduce fan energy by up to 50%, while air-source heat recovery chillers save approximately 450,000 gallons of water annually. These strategies resulted in 100% leasing before completion despite a Seattle science market where vacancy had reached 21%. eleven50 shows that resilience drives leasing performance, and offers a replicable model for science environments on difficult sites.