Some of the infrastructure in Ballard is so large that it’s virtually invisible. From rusting ship hulls in the canal to the marina complexes around the bridge, it is easy to overlook the evidence of industrial Seattle.
The block-long Magnum Storage building is among those too big to notice structures. It’s hard to wrap one’s mind around the fact that the hulking three-story wall on Shilshole Avenue is the same structure that sits behind a parking lot off Ballard Avenue between the Kavu outlet and the shuttered Great State Burger shop.
But attention is coming to the top corner of this building. Slop is opening and promises a new type of art space and venue that the city is missing. It’s not the industrial use that the neighborhood’s waterfront is accustomed. But Slop and the team of people running this space may be doing the hard work of energizing the city’s venues on a new, post-pandemic footing.
