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Bright Horizons child care center grabs South Lake Union site

Puget Sound Business Journal - July 2, 2010 - Jeanne Lang Jones - Puget Sound Business Journal

Child care provider Bright Horizons will open its second largest Puget Sound area day care center this fall in Seattle's South Lake Union neighborhood.

Bright Horizons has signed a long-term, 15-year lease with The Blume Co., of Seattle, for a 19,200-square-foot child care center at 1275 Mercer St.

"We've been watching development for that area for the last five years," said Debbie Brown, vice president for Northwest regional development for Bright Horizons. "We really saw there to be a growing employment base in that area that could provide the demographics we need to support work site child care."

Brown anticipates enrolling the offspring of working parents at a range of nearby employers, including Amazon.com Inc., the University of Washington, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and retailer REI, among others.

Bright Horizons' South Lake Union child care center will have the capacity to serve 246 children.

Founded in 1986, Watertown, Mass.-based Bright Horizons Family Solutions offers community and employer-sponsored child care and early education in the United States, Canada and Europe. The company provides care for children from 6 weeks to 6 years in age.

While some of Bright Horizons' child care centers are located on corporate campuses, others operate independently and serve members of the community as well as local employers. The company also provides college counseling services and backup care for children and elders.

Bright Horizons entered the Puget Sound area market in 1989, later merging with The Learning Garden in 1997. Presently, the company operates 18 child care centers in the Puget Sound area serving approximately 3,200 children.

Its largest child care center locally is a 40,000-square-foot facility in Redmond that has an enrollment of more than 500 children. Other locations in the state include Everett, Bothell, Kirkland, Bellevue, Redmond, Factoria, Issaquah, Renton, Kent and Richland.

Additionally, Bright Horizons runs two private elementary schools in Bellevue in which another 575 children are enrolled. Not counting the soon-to-open South Lake Union facility, the company has three more child care centers in development in West Seattle, the Magnuson Park/Sand Point neighborhoods and the Issaquah Highlands.

The new South Lake Union center will open this fall. The one-story brick building is located just west of Interstate 5 at the intersection of Mercer Street and Yale Avenue. At one time, the building was a manufacturing facility for Kenworth Trucks. Most recently it housed Bargreen Ellingson, a restaurant supplies distributor. The 30,000-square-foot first floor has 24-foot ceilings and uses steel beams for support, creating an immense open space without support posts. There is also a daylight basement providing an additional 20,000 square feet of space.

Bright Horizons is leasing all but 9,900 square feet of space on the first floor.

"It's a beautiful brick building that's pretty unique down here. Originally it was part of a master plan for the whole block," said CB Richard Ellis Senior Associate Cavan O'Keefe.

O'Keefe represented The Blume Co. in the lease negotiations, along with his uncle, CB Richard Ellis Executive Vice President Tim O'Keefe, and CB Vice President Jesse Ottele.  OfficeLease Managing Director Paul Suzman represented Bright Horizons.