Back in March we first got word that Cafe Bonjour would be consolidating its Queen Anne location with its Green Lake location, and moving out of its Queen Anne Avenue home to make way for a new eatery–Cafe de Lion.

The “luxury pastry boutique” celebrated its soft opening on Sunday, April 10, the 4th birthday of owners Daisuke and Tomoyo Miura’s son Lion, after whom the shop is named.

While visiting Seattle on business trip last summer, Daisuke and Tomoyo fell in love with the area, and an idea for a brand new business. They quickly wrapped up loose ends and made plans to move from San Diego to the Pacific Northwest, deciding to both live and open their new business here in Queen Anne.

“The town is really compact and the city has that European style,” Daisuke said. “When we came is was summer time, so we didn’t know it rains this much.”

Still, rain or not, for Tomoyo Seattle was the ideal place to open a French pastry cafe with a unique twist – one that combines traditional French pastries with flavors and seasonings inspired by the couple’s Japanese heritage. And so the concept behind Cafe de Lion was born.

Tomoyo, who studied French pastry making while living in France, started creating delectable sweets for special orders and catered events back in 2007, around the time Lion was born. At the time she was inspired to make sweets that were healthy for Lion to eat, and her recipes blossomed from there.

Everything on the menu – from the pastries, to the sandwiches, quiche, macaroons, chocolates, jams (fruit combinations mixed with milk caramel, vanilla or chocolate), gummy sweets, and coffee – is made from all natural ingredients, and organic when available. And despite the deceptively bright colors of some of the treats, Tomoyo says there is no food coloring in her pastries. Instead she artistically colors her creations with natural strawberry, raspberry and blueberry powders.

And while there’s no shortage of caffeine options in Seattle, or here on the hill for that matter, Cafe de Lion has an interesting take on coffee as well. In addition to offering a variety of coffee and tea drinks, the shop also makes what Daisuke referred to as traditional Japanese iced coffee, which requires overnight preparation, each concentrated drop slowly making its way through an elaborate brewing contraption over the course of an eight hour period.

“Japanese coffee houses, they all have this,” he said. “I wanted to bring that Japanese style to Seattle, the coffee town.”

Though Cafe de Lion’s website won’t have the menu listed for a few weeks, you can check out some of the sweet treats from the case on the cafe’s Facebook page. (Follow them on Twitter here).

In the meantime, Daisuke and Tomoyo say they are excited to become part of the neighborhood, as residents and business owners. And the reception so far has been wonderful.

“This is just a start for us. We want to be loved by the neighborhood,” Daisuke said. “Our goal is to be just like a neighbor–somebody in the corner house cooked something really good and wants to share it with the neighbors.”

Queen Anne-ers used to taking the Mercer Street on ramp and exit will have to find another way to and from I-5 this weekend. The Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) will be closing down the I-5 on and off ramps at Mercer Street in the first of four upcoming weekend closures due to utility improvements and ramp re-alignment work needed as part of the Mercer Corridor Project.

The closure will begin at 1 a.m. on Saturday, April 16, and run until 1 a.m. on Monday, April 18. There will also be a concurrent closure of the northbound I-5 on-ramp at University Street to improve safety and provide more efficient traffic flow around the closed Mercer Street exit lane.

Detour routes will be clearly market during the closure, though you can download the official detour maps here for access to I-5 and from I-5. From SDOT:

Three additional full weekend closures are tentatively scheduled and closure hours are anticipated to be Friday at 11:00 p.m. to Monday at 5:00 a.m.; further notification will be provided as the dates are finalized:

• May 6 – May 9
• May 13 – May 16
• May 20 – May 23

Travelers are encouraged to carpool and use alternate modes of transportation. Transit information can be found at:

• King County Metro at www.kingcounty.gov/metro, or by calling 206-553-3000
• Sound Transit at www.soundtransit.org
• Community Transit at www.commtrans.org

During weekend closures, Metro Transit plans to reroute its bus service on routes 70, 71, 72, 73 and 83 off of Fairview Avenue starting at 11:00 p.m. Friday night and lasting up to 5:00 a.m. Monday. The buses will be rerouted via Eastlake Avenue East: northbound between Mercer Street and Galer Street; and southbound from Galer Street to Thomas Street. Rerouted buses will serve posted stops on Eastlake Avenue, but will not make any stops on the cross streets between Eastlake and Fairview.

For more information on the closure and the Mercer Corridor Project, check out the project website.

A few readers wrote in earlier this week wondering about a film crew shooting at Kerry Park Tuesday evening, blocking off most of the block on Highland Drive. The crew was apparently from America’s Most Wanted, filming a segment on the unsolved homicide of Assistant U.S. Attorney Thomas C. Wales, who was fatally shot by a gunman at his Queen Anne home in October 2001. Coincidentally, the dedication for Thomas C. Wales Park, renamed in his honor in 2007, is happening this Saturday.

According to the Seattle Times, the AMW crew is filming all around the Seattle area this week, shooting in Pioneer Square, Queen Anne, Bainbridge Island and Lakewood for a number of re-enactments and features for the episode, which is scheduled to air on April 23 on KCPQ-TV.

One reader, Ted, noticed some more filming happening in the neighborhood, on W Lee, on Wednesday. Ted wrote,

They had the street signed off for no parking for most of the day so they had to file for permits. There were also alot of supply trucks and a huge RV which leads me to believe this is a bit more than a Microsoft training video.

I haven’t been able to confirm if this shoot was affiliated with the AMW shoot on Tuesday. Does anyone have any ideas what was filming on W Lee yesterday?

Molly Moon’s new ice cream shop will be located at 321 W. Galer St., Molly Moon’s publicist Jennifer Carroll told QueenAnneView Wednesday.

The lease for the address, currently occupied by Mes Amis pet boutique, was signed on Tuesday, according to Carroll. The doors are slated to open later this summer, but the official opening date has yet to be decided, Carroll said.

Molly Moon’s, with shops in Wallingford and Capitol Hill, held a contest between Madrona, Ballard and Queen Anne from December through February to decide where it would open its doors next. The local ice creamery ultimately decided to open a full shop in Queen Anne, and a smaller “micro-shop” in Madrona.

We reached out to the owner of Mes Amis for comment and to find out if the store would be moving to a new location or closing, and if so, when, but have not yet heard back. We’ll keep you posted on this story as we find out more.

Update 4/15 2:30 p.m.: We contacted Mes Amis owner Nicole Ryan for a comment a few days ago. At the time we first published this post, she had not heard back from her landlord on the status of the lease agreement. Nicole wrote back to us this morning confirming that Mes Amis will in fact be closing, though a final date has not yet been determined.

“I have a 5 year lease that is ending on August 31^st.  As my landlord was unwilling to negotiate the monthly rent, which has increased every year, I was faced with the decision to move the business, sell it, or simply close. Since I opened, 6 other independent pet shops in Seattle have closed, so every neighborhood has had a rough go of it. And because we have lived in QA for 10 years, I really did not want to take the store into a different neighborhood. So, I recently made the extremely difficult decision to close,” Nicole wrote us.

Nicole says she was not aware of Molly Moon’s plans to move into her shop space until well after the fact. She only got confirmation about the deal on Wednesday of this week, after the new lease with Molly Moon’s was signed. Before that she had only heard rumors about the deal, and then came across this report.

Though Nicole is sad to bring Mes Amis to a close, she’s looking forward to focusing her attention on her two-year-old, and the corporate job she’s recently returned to. “However, there will be many, many tears when I finally do close up shop,” she wrote.

Mes Amis has the space through the end of August. Nicole says she’s been given the option to leave early, however she hasn’t yet decided if she wants to take or leave that offer.

“I am thrilled for the neighborhood, but I just wish things had been executed a different way. I was forced to tell my employees much earlier than I had planned on, and of course, once word gets out that a store is closing, business suffers greatly,” she wrote.

In the meantime Mes Amis is very much alive and well. There are no current plans to change anything about the store, its products, or hours.

A Lower Queen Anne resident is wrapping up her first year as owner and CEO of a company that sells protective swimwear for children.

Betsy Wanless has been running SwimZip out of her Uptown apartment since early last year with the help of her brother in Charlottesville, Virginia. It was while vacationing with her brother in Cancun that the inspiration for the company’s line of full-zipper rash guards came after watching her niece struggle with her swim shirt.

Photo from LinkedIn

“We searched around and there wasn’t anything else around like it,” said Wanless. “So we were like, ‘ok, let’s go make them,” and so we made them and have been selling them ever since.”

She said business has been going well and has even picked up since quitting her job as an account manager at Disney three weeks ago to run the business full time.

Wanless, who has a degree in economics and business from the University of Puget Sound, said she never thought she’d own a clothing business.

“I’m not really a clothing person … it’s kind of random but it’s been super fun,” she said.

Her company sells its products online, but Wanless is looking to sell in stores in the Seattle-area, and has been in contact with boutiques in Queen Anne, as well as with larger retail stores like Nordstrom. The 2011 line of SwimZip clothing is scheduled to be ready in May.

She said she’s been working closely with Cause Haun, CEO of Seattle-area children’s shoe company See Kai Run, and receiving guidance from her.

Wanless, who has been living in Queen Anne for the last year and a half, said she hopes to be in the neighborhood for a long time, and that her and her fiancé are looking for homes in Upper Queen Anne.

The Aurora Traffic Safety Project is going to be running a large-scale safe driving enforcement patrol along Aurora Ave N on Thursday, April 14.

From the Seattle Department of Transportation:

On April 14^th beginning at 6:30 am and running all day and evening, the Seattle Police Department, Washington State Patrol and Washington Liquor Control Board will be conducting a major traffic enforcement patrol to deter aggressive and distracted driving on Aurora. Specifically the patrol will focus on the behaviors we know are contributing to collisions, injuries and deaths along Aurora such as speeding, following too close, unsafe turns, DUI, cell phone usage and other in car distractions.

Tomorrow’s patrol is part of the Aurora Traffic Safety Project, a two year effort to “improve safety through engineering improvements, increased enforcement, and educational outreach” along Aurora Ave N. Some 1,581 collisions occurred on Aurora between the Battery Street Tunnel and N 145^th Street between April 2005 and March 2008. These figures add up to nearly 46 collisions per month. Since the project began in 2009, collisions on Aurora have been reduced by more than 20 percent, according to SDOT.

Aurora is a busy thoroughfare and thriving community. Making it safer means getting the safe driving message out to all drivers on Aurora. Our goal is to change driver behavior to make Aurora safer; not write citations. A big part of achieving this goal is getting the safe driving reminder out to drivers well before the emphasis patrol.

More than 50 Seattle Police Department personnel will be participating in the patrol, which will include squad car and motorcycle units, the aggressive drivers response team, and the DUI squad. Six patrol units from the Washington State Patrol and three teams from the Washington Liquor Control Board will also be participating in the program, which will be operating out of a unified command center will be established at 125^th and Aurora.

The Aurora Traffic Safety Project is trying to increase awareness about the patrol, so tell your friends and neighbors. For more information about the project, visit the Aurora Traffic Safety Project website.

The Uptown Alliance‘s monthly meeting is happening this Thursday, April 14 from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Lower Queen Anne Metropolitan Market.

There are a number of interesting topics on the agenda for this month’s meeting, including ongoing developments in the West Mercer Place debate, the redevelopment plan for the Uptown Triangle area, and possible locations for a low-cost housing development in Uptown. Check out the agenda here:

1. Greetings and introductions – Approve minutes
2. What are your potential Uptown Alliance topics, concerns, issues? We’re listening to you!
3. West Mercer Place and Mercer West Project: SDOT presentation (Eric O’Brien) – Should Uptown Alliance give further input to Mercer West?
4. Community Day School Assn. (Matt Adkins) (5 min.)
5. Uptown Triangle EIS: Next Steps (Hooper, Kenny, Coney) – Should Uptown Alliance apply for a small & simple grant to begin funding of the EIS process, leading to a larger DON grant in ’12?
6. Low-cost housing in Uptown: (Hooper) – Possible locations.
7. Minor rezone considerations for Uptown (Hooper, Coney, Kenny)
8. Privately Funded Mobility Plan report (Coney)
9. Urban Decay symptoms: (Coney, Kenny) – New Center City leadership group is forming.
10. New Business: bring your own topics and comments.

The next meeting will be held at 7 p.m. on Thursday, May 14 at Met Market. As always the meeting will take place in the Met Market restaurant space on the far west side of the building. Meeting attendees should enter the market under the escalator at the southwest corner of the building and turn left past the cash registers at the lunch counter into the restaurant space.

For more information on the Uptown Alliance group, its activities, and meetings, contact Rick Hooper at Nsilberg@silberg.net or John Coney at  djohnconey@aol.com.

Thanks to our sister site My Green Lake for this story.

In February, the Seattle Parks Foundation launched an online community survey to get input from the people of Seattle about the city’s parks system. The survey results will be used to help shape a set of community recommendations on a how to address the chronic funding shortfall faced by Seattle’s parks.

A PDF of the survey results is now available and can be viewed here. We will keep you posted as the Parks Foundation moves forward and develops funding recommendations.

Seattle Parks and Recreation, the Thomas C. Wales Foundation and the Seattle Office of Arts & Cultural Affairs are hosting a dedication for Queen Anne’s newest green space, Thomas C. Wales Park, at 10 a.m. this Saturday, April 16.

The 1.3 acre park, located at 2401 6th Ave North just off Dexter Avenue, opened quietly back in October in the space formerly known as Dexter Pit Park. When the park was redesigned last fall, artist Adam Kuby created five raised gabion “Quarry Rings”, providing an urban wildlife habitat for many birds and bats that nest in the park, and a design that matches the park’s unique history. The stone and gravel used to make the rings are a tribute to the park’s previous use as a gravel pit in the early 1990′s.

A variety of indigenous, bird friendly plants were chosen to support artist Adam Kuby’s vision of creating avian habitat in the gabion-ring sculptures. The elevated, stone-filled rings echo the history of the site as a gravel quarry, and gesture to its future as a wildlife sanctuary

The park was renamed in December of 2007 after the late Assistant U.S. Attorney Thomas C. Wales, who was murdered in his Queen Anne home in 2001.

“Thomas C. Wales Park is a wonderful memorial to Tom, who loved Seattle and his Queen Anne neighborhood,” Rick Wales, brother of Tom Wales and founding chairman of the Thomas C. Wales Foundation, said in a press release. “He was a big believer in supporting and developing public spaces in which people could convene and connect, helping to inspire civic engagement and passionate citizenship amongst neighbors. The Foundation is honored to join Seattle Parks and Recreation, and the Queen Anne Community Council in honoring Tom, his vision and dedication to community.”

The dedication Saturday will include a performance by the John Hay Chorus, a chance to learn about birding from Seattle Audubon members, and an official ribbon cutting ceremony with members of the Wales family, the artist, and a number of elected officials, including Mayor Mike McGinn, who will be leading a Q&A in the neighborhood later in the afternoon.

The redesign of the park was funded by the Pro Parks Levy, approved by Seattle voters in 2000. Over the last eight years the levy has provided $198.2 million in funding for more than 100 projects citywide.

After the dedication, Mayor McGinn will be taking a walking tour of Lower Queen Anne and Kinnear Park, followed by a Q&A session from 12:30 to 1:30 p.m. at Bayview Manor, located at 11 W Aloha. Community members are invited to pose questions, voice concerns, or simply share what’s on their minds with the Mayor and city department representatives.

For more information on the Q&A portion of the event please contact Liz Birkholz at liz.birkholz@seattle.gov or 206-233-5107.

Real estate figures for Queen Anne and Magnolia have not improved since February, according to Managing Broker with John L. Scott Real Estate John Madrid.

Based on numbers from the Northwest Multiple Listing Service, he said it was another difficult month for Queen Anne and Magnolia with prices down significantly compared to the same time last year, as well as being down from the numbers last month.

He’s cautiously optimistic, however, pointing out that the market is still in the “balanced” range at 4.28 months of inventory on the market.

The figures given by Madrid, which are also posted on his blog, can be compared to last month’s here.

Buyers in the region have plenty of homes to choose from, although selection has tapered down compared to a year ago, according to a NWMLS press release on March real estate activity for Western Washington.

“In fact, some urban core neighborhoods, such as Greenlake, Queen Anne and West Bellevue, are seeing very strong demand, and a waning supply of desirable homes for sale,” said President and COO of Coldwell Banker Bain Mike Grady in the NWMLS press release.

Overall, the current real estate statistics give reason for optimism when considering this year’s lack of the federal tax credits used by home buyers last year, said Grady.

“Most real estate professionals will be happy to move past the year-over-year comparisons that have been made the first few months of 2011, as they reflect the boost given home sales by last year’s Homebuyer Tax Credit,” said Grady. “Home sales are now standing on their own — without the benefit of incentives — and the market is actually behaving quite typically.”

NWMLS Director and President of Windermere Real Estate Company OB Jacobi agreed that the market is doing remarkably well without a stimulus.

“Considering that this time last year there was a rush of buyers trying to beat the tax credit deadline, to have the number of sales off just slightly points towards a strengthening market,” said Jacobi in the NWMLS press release.

Queen Anne resident Martin Ramirez was the victim of another car prowl on the hill this weekend. He wanted to relay the event to serve as a reminder to neighbors to not leave items of value in your car:

On Saturday night (4/9) – Sunday Morning (4/10) someone broke into my car parked on Blaine St. I noticed because I saw a stack of shuffled papers around and my iPod missing, they also took half of an old checkbook that fell off my laptop. I reported the incident to the police and talked to the neighbors so they are aware.

You know that bridge above from the way it is on the left. There was a time not too long ago, however, when it looked a lot more like the image on the right. If you’re a regular reader of Seattle Times Sunday magazine, you’re used to seeing Paul Dorpat’s popular ‘Now And Then’ column, featuring the contrasting images of old and new Seattle like this one.

This past weekend, the Museum of History and Industry unveiled a “Now and Then” exhibit, styled after Dorpat’s column. The exhibit include the work of Jean Sherrard and Berangere Lomont and features photos of four locales: Seattle, Washington State, the Wallingford neighborhood and Paris.

The exhibit runs through June 3, 2012. Now and Then tours at the University of Washington are scheduled for April 17, May 15 and May 18. Check the MOHAI calendar for more information.

H/T: SeattlePI.com

The Seattle Department of Transportation let us know in February about the upcoming changes to Dexter Avenue intended to help ease congestion caused by car, bus and bicyclist overlaps as well as improve the pavement condition by repaving the street.

That work began Monday as SDOT’s contractor began grinding and removing the existing asphalt pavement on Dexter Avenue North between Fremont Avenue N and McGraw Street.

During the work, one travel lane in each direction will be open on Dexter. There will be parking and loading restrictions near the work zone as well as periodic cross-street and driveway interruptions.

Paving will commence in April. Drivers and bicyclists are urged to seek out alternative routes when possible. For more information on this project, visit the SDOT web site.

Seattle Pacific University food and nutrition students are preparing to launch a brand new community kitchen, offering monthly programs to train students and help limited-income individuals learn about how to make healthy meals on a budget. Student volunteers gathered last Wednesday for a training session for the program, which will open its doors to the public this week.

Beginning this Wednesday, April 13, the community kitchen will educate participants on cooking, working from recipes and preparing nutritious and inexpensive food in a group workshop held one Wednesday per month. The cost to attend is $10, which includes between 10 and 12 servings of food per individual that participants can take home with them at the end of the class.

“We’re all very excited about it,” said Associate Professor of Nutrition Daniela Geleva, who initiated the program and has been involved in the larger community kitchen movement in Seattle for the last few years. “I’ve gotten a lot of support from colleagues and students.”

The idea for the community kitchen sprung from Geleva after the renovation of a space in the basement of Peterson Hall into a five-kitchen cooking lab last summer. Anxious to share the space with the community, Geleva said she applied for and received a $2,563 grant last November from the SERVE program that funds projects that help students explore their vocations.

“I wanted to allow our own students to utilize their skills they learn in the classroom in real life, by not just practicing but also sharing those skills with other people and serving other people,” said Geleva.

Community kitchens began in Peru to address poverty and food shortages in the 1960s, according to the Community Kitchens Northwest website. It spread to other countries, in particular Canada where thousands of these kitchens exist today. They began popping up in Seattle in 2007, and now SPU’s will mark the 12^th in the area. Central Washington University in Ellensburg is planning on opening its own community kitchen program beginning in August, said Geleva.

“College campuses are the perfect place for this,” said Geleva.

Community kitchens can serve a range of interests, she says. Individuals can use the program to not only save money on food, but to learn how to make nutritious, inexpensive meals. The more important aspect, according to Geleva, is building a sense of community.

The extracurricular program is composed of 12 food and nutritional sciences undergraduate volunteers. Two students were chosen as coordinators, who are paid for the extra amount of work and planning they do.

“Our students are excited about the idea and want to use their time to serve the community,” said Geleva.

Geleva has been working with the local food bank, low-income housing buildings and community centers to get the word out, and she is also reaching out to SPU students with financial needs. A flyer on the program can be seen here.

She hopes that the program can be self-sustaining in the future, relying not on grant money but on partnerships with food producers, donations, food not sold at farmers markets, the SPU community garden and fundraising. Geleva also hopes that down the line the program will be able to either add additional nights a month or increase the capacity of 16 individuals per night.

To sign up or for questions about the program, you can contact Geleva at dgeleva@spu.edu.

Apparel and accessories boutique Peridot moved to its new home 532 Queen Anne Ave and opened six days earlier than expected this weekend.

The new space, the former home of Underdawg Records, is larger than the boutique’s previous shop just one block away on 1st Ave W, allowing Peridot to expand its stock to include more clothing designers, jewelry and shoes.

Find out more about the shop and its offerings at the Peridot website. More details on what you can find at the new space here.

Just down the block from the new Peridot, the Lower Queen Anne Blockbuster closed its doors for good this weekend.

Blockbuster first announced it would be closing the Lower Queen Anne store back in February, a year and a half after shuttering the Upper Queen Anne store. The store shut its doors for the final time on Sunday, after selling the majority of stock on clearance. The shop’s shelves were pretty bare on Saturday, with a handful titles interspersed here and there throughout the empty isles. Everything that wasn’t sold before closing was moved to another store, according to a Blockbuster employee. Still no work on what, if anything, will go into this storefront.

The Seattle Mayor’s office and the University of Washington reached out again last week to ask neighborhood residents to participate in a new neighborhood survey on crime, put together by grad students at the prestigious Evans School of Public Affairs at the university.

The online survey “will help determine residents’ primary public safety concerns in their own neighborhoods and on public transportation.”

With this survey, the City hopes to have a snapshot of perceptions of the police and public safety at a neighborhood-by-neighborhood level. The survey also gives residents an opportunity to anonymously offer their opinions on the police and public safety in Seattle — a new option for this kind of survey.

The new survey asks residents their opinion of public safety conditions in Seattle’s urban villages, if there are any urban villages they avoid, and why.

You’ll have choices like these on crime:

• Very serious problem

• Serious problem

• Minor problem

• Not a problem

Question No. 9 asks you to name the most serious crime problems in your neighborhood. There’s a list of 20 choices – including “no crime” and “other.” You get to pick no more than five.

There are 47 questions – possibly more if you ride transit often – including ones dealing with police harassment and effectiveness. You can take the survey- it takes about a quarter-hour – here. The Evans School will release the results to the mayor’s Youth and Family Initiative in May.

One man has been hospitalized after a house fire at 7th Ave W and Crockett Street this evening, according to the Seattle Fire Department.

Firefighters were called to 1953 7th Ave W just before 7 p.m. Sunday evening with reports of a fire in the single family residence. The fire, which was quickly put out by SFD, was contained to the basement of the house, according to fire officer Charlie Cordova.

There were three people in the house at the time of the fire. Two were able to get out safely, while the third, who was semi-conscious when firefighters arrived, was immediately transported to the hospital, according to Cordova.

The victim was reportedly pulled out of the “fully involved house fire” by firefighters, according to tipster Silver Miller, who heard additional information on the police scanner. “Medics said he was sluggish and had what appeared to be second degree burns to his face, arms, hands and pelvis,” Silver reported.

The Seattle Fire Department was not able to provide any additional information on the victim or his injuries. No one else was hurt in the fire, the cause of which is currently under investigation, according to Cordova.

Seattle firefighters are on the scene of a house fire at 1953 7th Ave W. According to Silver in the forum, one person was rescued from the fully involved fire. We have a call into the public information officer and will update this post when we know more.