OpenStreetMap (new tab)

Google Map (new tab)

Google Streetview (new tab)

Overview

The Advanta Office Commons complex included three office buildings and a parking garage containing 720,000 square feet of space. Seattle architects CollinsWoerman designed this office park for the Seattle, WA, and Denver, CO-based developer Schnitzer West.

Building History

Designed by CollinsWoerman, this grouping of three office towers and a parking garage was sited on Bellevue's I-90 office building corridor. Schnitzer West, its developer, began construction in 08/2008 and completed work by 07/2010, a period marked by the serious Recession of 2008, that lasted more than two years. Schnitzer West's website said of Advanta: "The energy-efficient 600,000 SF campus features three 7-story buildings surrounding a beautifully landscaped outdoor plaza. With a dramatic, light-filled Great Room as its centerpiece, Advanta is packed with features to enhance productivity, including an on-site conference and training center, fitness facility and digital media center." (See Schnitzer West.com, "Advanta Office Commons," accessed 02/21/2024.)

Microsoft Corporation leased two building projects from Schnitzer West, which changed its name from Schnitzer Northwest, in 2007. As noted by business writer Brian K. Miller: "The news [of the name change] comes on the heels of a big win for the company in Bellevue. In early April, Microsoft Corp. inked long-term leases for the entirety of Schnitzer’s two under-construction office developments in Bellevue totaling 1.3 million sf. Headquartered in the neighboring Redmond, the public software company leased the 740,000-sf Bravern Office Commons next to Meydenbauer Center in Downtown Bellevue and the 600,000-sf Advanta Office Commons adjacent to Interstate 90 in southeast Bellevue." (See Brian K. Miller, Globest.com, "Schnitzer Northwest Becomes Schnitzer West," published 05/29/2007, accessed 02/21/2024.) Due to the prevalence of telecommuting after the COVID-19 epidemic, Microsoft Corporation did not renew its Advanta lease in 2023. (See Victor Whitman, "Swimming in Office Space," Seattle Times,02/11/2024, p. C10.)

Telecommuting after the COVID-19 epidemic caused office space needs of companies like Microsoft to shrink. Microsoft left at least two buildings from the Advanta complex in 2023. It also allowed leases to expire on space it leased in City Center Plaza, Lincoln Square North, and The Bravern Office Commons in Bellevue in 2023. Many other Bellevue office complexes built during the 1980s through the 2000s to accommodate expanding technology businesses emptied during the switch to telecommuting. Older office buildings, with fewer amenities, were often abandoned first, creating more demand on more recent, "premium," office space. This, however, did not inhibit Microsoft from leaving recently-completed, amenity-rich buildings like Advanta and The Bravern. (See Victor Whitman, "Swimming in...Office Space," Seattle Times, 02/11/2024, p. C5, C10.)

PCAD id: 24996