Is anyone else concerned about the present and future architectural character of our Kirkland community?

Over the last several years, Kirkland has experienced a lot of infill housing throughout our community. I’ve noticed that recently, the design trend in residential housing is to offer large, modern “box” architectural styles, with large rectangular windows and big price tags.

This new design trend seems to be dominating the new single family housing market around our town. What ever happened to more traditional housing styles like Craftsman, etc. which seem to stand the test of time, and never go out of style?

If think about what has happened with much of the commercial real estate in the downtown Seattle commercial core, where the dubious office building architecture of the 1950’s and 1960’s is now being torn down and replaced with new development, while much of the high quality architectural structures from the 1920 and 1930’s are value d and preserved. Everyone has different tastes, and that of course extends to our various housing types. But a note to area developers doing work in our city, let’s see some real choices in housing styles in our neighborhood infill areas.

Keith Dunbar, Kirkland