Bird's-Eye View of Seattle, 1891

The story of this map

Two years after the Great Fire of 1889 burned its business district to the ground, Seattle had rebuilt itself in brick and stone and was ready to be admired. Augustus Koch, a German-born artist who drew bird’s-eye views of towns all across the West, produced this enormous portrait in 1891, printed by the Hughes Lithograph Company of Chicago. Our restored print is made from the Library of Congress copy, the largest and highest-resolution scan in our American Cities collection.

Koch puts you in the air over Elliott Bay looking east. The waterfront is lined with wharves, steamers and sailing ships; behind it the new downtown climbs the hill in solid blocks, each building drawn with its windows and cornice; and the neighbourhoods spread across the ridges toward the lakes behind the city. The sheet takes in the environs of King County as well as the town, and a numbered index picks out the buildings and businesses that mattered in 1891.

This is a print that rewards standing close, and at 24x36 inches you can. It suits a Capitol Hill living room, a Pioneer Square office or a Puget Sound cabin, and its cool greys, greens and water blues suit the Northwest palette. It pairs with the Puget Sound chart from our Nautical Charts collection or the Mount Rainier panoramic map from our Topographic collection.

Printed to order on archival matte paper and framed in the country of delivery.

Before and after

Left: the archive scan exactly as published. Right: the file that goes to the printer.

Archive scanRestored

Restoration notes

Restoration plan: crop scan margins, balance colour cast and levels while keeping the paper tone, remove library stamps and scanner artefacts if present, gentle sharpening. No repainting of original content.

Every print carries its archive credit on the packing slip. Paper tone and small imperfections of the original are kept on purpose; nothing is redrawn.