University of Washington Tacoma

The UW Tacoma campus occupies a cluster of restored late-Victorian industrial buildings in the warehouse district, just north of the Museum of Glass and the Bridge of Glass. The campus architecture is a successful example of the adaptive reuse that defines much of Tacoma's downtown revitalisation — brick warehouses and rail-era commercial buildings converted to classrooms, offices, and student facilities without losing their industrial character.

Even if you have no connection to the university, the campus is worth walking through. The buildings are handsome, the open spaces between them are well-designed, and the concentration of restored historic architecture gives a better sense of Tacoma's 19th-century commercial ambition than most of the surviving downtown streetscape. The campus is also the northern anchor of the Prairie Line Trail.

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A story
The University of Washington Tacoma was established in 1990 after decades of advocacy by community leaders who argued that Tacoma needed its own university campus rather than relying on Seattle. The campus was built in the historic Union Depot and Warehouse District, converting 19th-century brick industrial buildings into academic space — a model of adaptive reuse that helped anchor the revitalisation of downtown Tacoma's warehouse district.

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