Paul Allen's Wide World

During one week this spring, Paul Allen tested theater seats for his Cinerama, quizzed architects on why certain ridges on their football stadium models didn't align, watched his Blazers get eliminated from the NBA playoffs, collected a smashed grunge guitar for his coming rock-'n'-roll museum at Seattle Center, sold his on-line content company to Disney, rehearsed with his garage band, gave WSU $500,000, and evaluated real estate projects from Renton to Issaquah to Union Station near the Kingdome.

He owns investments in more than 40 high-tech and multi-media companies and properties across the globe. The accompanying graphic is by no means complete, even for his regional interests, but you get the idea.

Whatever Works Allen's business portfolio stretches beyond the wired world

UNION STATION PROJECT: Partner in a $250-million refurbishing of the historic former train station and development around it. Will include about 1 million square feet of office space on more than seven acres. Allen plans to build his own 11-story office tower directly south of the station and will move one of his companies, Vulcan Northwest, there.

FOOTBALL STADIUM AND EXHIBITION HALL: Construction scheduled to begin this summer on a new 325,000-square-foot exhibition hall that will sit between the new Mariner and Seahawks stadiums. Barring miracle or delay, the Kingdome will come down in January 2000. The new outdoor stadium should be open for the 2002 season. The open-air grass stadium is patterned after Husky Stadium.

SOUTH LAKE UNION: Eleven acres scattered south of Lake Union. Allen donated $21 million so backers of the proposed park could buy the property. It reverted to his ownership when Seattle voters turned down the Commons proposal. It runs from the playfield on Denny Way to property on the south shore of Lake Union. He is listening to offers and weighing development plans.

MICROSOFT: He co-founded the Redmond software giant with Bill Gates before leaving in 1983 after contracting Hodgkins Disease, now in remission. He still sits on the board and owns more than $16 billion worth of stock.

CLEAR BLUE SKY PRODUCTIONS: Allen created the company to originate, develop and finance "artistically driven" film projects. His sister, Jody Patton, is executive director. John Sayles' latest movie, "Men With Guns," was one of its first projects.

HUSKY STADIUM: One of Allen's new companies, Action Sports Media, will provide scoreboards and sell the advertising to go on them. He hopes the stadium will be the temporary home for his Seahawks for the 2000 and 2001 seasons.

PORT QUENDALL: Has the option to buy about 40 waterfront acres on the northern edge of Renton. He bought the option in 1996 intending to build a huge high-tech campus that would possibly include a marina and convention center. He has extended his option several times because cleanup of the contaminated site looks daunting.

BELLEVUE OFFICES: Two of his companies, Vulcan Northwest and Asymetrix Learning Systems, are headquartered in the same Bellevue office building. They represent his main investing, technology and new-media businesses, but he has stakes in more than 40 related companies.

SEAHAWKS: Allen paid $200 million for the team in 1997 and is re-building it partly through splashy free-agent signings and huge salary bonuses.

PORTLAND TRAIL BLAZERS/ROSE GARDEN: Owns the basketball team, the city's only pro sports franchise, and the $262 million Rose Garden, a state-of-the-art arena. He contributed $46 million of his own money, and the Oregon Arena Corp. (OAC), which he owns, raised from private sources an additional $182 million. The city paid the rest.

ISSAQUAH: Allen paid $12.75 million for 20 acres, part of the Sammamish Park Place corporate campus in late 1996. He is developing office space.

CINERAMA THEATRE: Allen purchased the 845-seat Cinerama in February for $3.75 million after hearing the owners were planning to radically change it. He is renovating it, from fixing the roof to repairing its chairs. He says he loved going there as a kid and considered it a Seattle landmark.

HOLLYWOOD: In 1995, Allen invested $500 million in DreamWorks SKG, the recent all-digital entertainment studio that includes moguls Steven Spielberg, Jeffrey Katzenberg and David Geffen. Allen is the single largest investor in the studio. GameWorks, which has an arcade in downtown Seattle, is a subsidiary.

TETON RIDGE RANCH in eastern Idaho: billed as an "upscale, small luxurious guest ranch" amid the Tetons. The resort includes a 10,000-square-foot lodge and hiking, horse riding, mountain biking, fishing and skiing.

MARCUS CABLE: Allen bought the 10th-largest cable operator in the country in April, giving his "wired world," the fiber-optic wires he believes will revolutionize computers, television and cable. He paid $2.7 billion for the Dallas, Texas-based business.

ASYMETRIX LEARNING SYSTEMS: His first company outside of Microsoft, founded in 1985. Allen has narrowed the company focus to online education and training.

VULCAN VENTURES: This is Allen's investment arm that hunts for opportunities, manages his wide range of investments and wades through unsolicited business plans. Its portfolio also includes his 7.5 percent share in Microsoft.

VULCAN NORTHWEST: Allen's umbrella organization encompasses Vulcan Ventures, Football Northwest, First & Goal, the charitable foundations and the Experience Music Project. It employs about 80 people and is managed by Allen's sister, Jody Patton.

INTERVAL RESEARCH: In 1992, Allen opened up this high-tech research lab in Palo Alto with a pledge to spend at least $100 million over 10 years. The workers, who include computer scientists, artists, psychologists, and even journalists, work in near secrecy to try to find the next big thing. It has spun off a company called Purple Moon, which produces software for girls between 8 and 12.

Leisure Time Music, travel, sports, movies, planes, yachts and more

RECORDING STUDIO: Somewhere in Seattle sits a state-of-the-art private recording studio where his band, The Grown Men, practice. He plays lead guitar.

EXPERIENCE MUSIC PROJECT: On the eastern edge of Seattle Center and just beneath the Space Needle, the 135,000-square-foot interactive museum will celebrate creativity in music. It will feature elaborate displays, a huge array of memorabilia, and colorful, bizarre and "swoopy" architecture. It is costing Allen more than $100 million and he says ever penny of profit will go back into the project.

BOEING FIELD HANGAR: A 171,000-square-foot hangar holds multiple aircraft including his Boeing 757 and a Challenger 601 jet.

ALLAN ISLAND: A 280-acre island in Burrows Bay near Anacortes. Allen paid $7.4 million for it in 1992. It remains undeveloped. He offered it to Camp Nor'Wester, but it was determined unsuitable by the camp board.

YACHT: A 198-foot state-of-the-art Meduse, costing about $40 million and launched in 1996, comes complete with helipad for an eight-person helicopter. The yacht has six guest staterooms, a theater, a 48-track digital recording studio, an exercise room and is staffed by a crew of 15.

Places to Call Home From Mercer Island to the Big Apple and France

MERCER ISLAND HOME: His 40,000-square-foot waterfront mansion sits on six acres. The estate includes a gymnasium (with full-size basketball court and tennis court), a 20-seat theater, a recording studio, a mini-observatory, fiber-optic wiring and significant pieces of art. The estate also includes his mother's 10,000-square-foot home that holds 15,000 books.

SPERRY PENINSULA: Purchased the 387-acre spit on Lopez Island for $8 million in 1996. Includes a home each for him, his mother and his sister as well as a house for a caretaker. He also is building a 10-bathroom "bunkhouse," and a tennis court. His purchase displaced Camp Nor'Wester, a youth summer camp that had operated there for 51 years.

SKY LOFT: Up in the rafters at catwalk level of the Rose Garden in Portland sits a two-bedroom apartment for Allen. Open a blind and you look almost straight down on the court. He also owns a condo in downtown Portland.

BEVERLY HILLS: Allen bought a 122-acre property in Beverly Hills for $20 million, real-estate sources there say. The house is a Spanish Colonial Revival-style built in the 1920s for cowboy actor Fred Thomson and his wife, Oscar-winning screenwriter Frances Marion.

NEW YORK: Allen reportedly paid roughly $14 million for an 11th-floor, 16-room condo at Manhattan's Fifth Avenue and East 66th Street. The biggest space is said to be a 36-by-24-foot library. Allen's sister, Jody Patton, also is said to own an apartment in the building.

FRANCE: He owns a villa in the south of France and has hosted huge and elaborate parties there during the Cannes Film Festival.

Spreading the Wealth Allen's philanthropy has always matched his interests and loyalties

PHI KAPPA THETA FRATERNITY, WSU: Allen bankrolled the $3.1 million, ultra high-tech rebuilding of the fraternity house, where he stayed when he attended WSU two decades ago. He also furnished six high-speed Pentium 133 computers.

UW'S ALLEN LIBRARY: A $10-million wing donated in the memory of his late father, Kenneth, who was an associate librarian there. Kenneth Allen died in 1983.

PAUL G. ALLEN FOUNDATIONS: Gives away millions to further medical research, promote the arts, save forests and other causes. The Experience Music Project is also a gift that may cost him $120 million by the time it opens in 1999.

Donations of $1 million or more

$10 Million Allen Library, UW Lakeside School

$5 Million Henry Art Gallery Starbright Pediatric Network Nature Conservancy of Washington

$3 Million UW Prostatitis research SETI Institute

$2.5 Million Seattle Public Library

$2 Million Seattle Children's Theatre ACT Theatre Fred Hutchinson Stanford University (Calif.) Shoah Foundation (Calif.) Pacific Science Center Cable Museum (Denver)

$1 Million Children's Hospital Doernbecher Hospital (Portland) Whitman College (Walla Walla)