Seattle Senior Project Targets a Green First

Scheduled for completion in spring 2021, Aegis Living Lake Union will be the first assisted living community to achieve an elite international green status certification.

Aegis Living Lake Union. Image courtesy of Aegis Living

Aegis Living started construction on a 79-unit senior living community in Seattle’s Eastlake neighborhood that is being built to be emission free. When completed in spring 2021, Aegis Living Lake Union will be the world’s greenest facility of its kind.

The 73,437-square-foot building, which will have assisted living and memory care units, is expected to be the first assisted living community to meet the rigorous global green and sustainability standards with a Living Building Challenge certification. It is also participating in the city of Seattle’s Living Building Pilot program. Officials of the Bellevue, Wash.,-based company said they have also developed new energy and water consumption benchmarks for the senior living category.


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Aegis Living Lake Union, with six stories above ground and one underground, will have a mix of studio and one-bedroom options along with select apartments dedicated to memory care. Amenities will include a spa and wellness center, massage and fitness center. There will also be a variety of gathering spaces to spend time with family and friends, including an onsite cinema and sky lounge with views of Lake Union. Designed by Ankrom Moisan Architects, the building will be modeled after a modern shellhouse and will pay tribute to the 1936 University of Washington men’s rowing team that took gold at the Berlin Olympics. Other development team members include the contractor, Absher Construction, and energy modeler, Pacific Architects and Engineers.

The community will offset more than the building’s total energy demand through various energy reduction measures, including triple pane windows, thermal insulation for exterior walls, heat recovery through forced-air ventilation, a recirculating heat pump system, high-efficiency appliances,  LED lighting and sensors to monitor use. Aegis Living is installing 85kW of PV as a solar array on the building rooftop. The system is designed to supply about 88,000 kW hours per year to the building. The company will also be using energy from an offsite solar farm, although the location has not been determined.

The property will also have several water-saving features. All non-drinking water will be supplied through captured rainwater and treated greywater. Potable water will be reserved for consumption only. These measures are expected to save more than 140,000 gallons of water a year for the building.

Building on Green

Aegis Living, which was founded in 1997 by Dwayne Clark, chairman & CEO, has been incorporating green-building measures in its communities for several years. Among the examples are Aegis Living Rogers Park and Aegis Living Ravenna, two Seattle properties that are certified four-star “Built Green” by the Master Builders Association for incorporating energy-efficiency measures, careful materials selection and recycling programs and other sustainable features. Aegis Bellevue Overlake in Bellevue, the company’s largest property with 122 units, will also have a solar array when it opens in late 2020. The company also plans to include the greywater measures in two Seattle-area properties, Aegis Living Ballard and Aegis Living Greenwood, which will be built soon.

The company currently operates 32 communities in Washington, California and Nevada with seven in development. Earlier this year, Aegis broke ground on a 106-unit building along the waterfront in Kirkland, Wash., that is scheduled to deliver in summer 2021. In addition to Greenwood and Ballard, Aegis Living is also building another Seattle facility in the Laurelhurst neighborhood. It is planning another property in San Rafael, Calif., set to open in 2021. In July, the company opened Aegis Living Mercer Island, an 89-unit senior community near Seattle. The 104,000-square-foot lodge-inspired building has assisted living, memory care and short-term care units with studio, one-bedroom and two-bedroom floorplans.