explore pioneer square
Welcome to the Original Seattle Neighborhood – rich in history, arts, culture, and food!
Pioneer Place Park is fronted by the Pioneer Building, the first of three legacy buildings established by Henry Yesler after the Great Seattle Fire of 1889. Notice that many of the buildings around you look very similar. When the fire destroyed a 30-block area, more than 50 buildings were rebuilt in the Richardsonian Romanesque architectural style. In 1889, a group of local businessmen returned from a tour of Alaska with a 60-foot totem pole stolen from a Tlingit Native American village. When a vandal burned down the original in 1938, the city paid Tlingit craftsmen to carve the replica you see here today. The adjacent iron and glass pergola was originally built in 1909 over underground restrooms and also served as a cable car stop. In 2001, a truck accidentally crashed into this designated national landmark, and the pergola was rebuilt in its original location.
