Reflecting on idea of a chapel

If you give a lavish public gift but few seem to want it, is it actually a gift at all?

That's the conundrum facing a multimillionaire art collector from Hunts Point who is trying to build an architectural monument — a meditative chapel — in the Seattle area. His name is Barney Ebsworth, 71. He made a fortune in the cruise ship and travel business, and he moved here from St. Louis about a decade ago. He has one of the world's largest collections of modern American art, with paintings by Jasper Johns, Jackson Pollock and Georgia O'Keeffe. He's a trustee to the Seattle Art Museum.

His dream, friends say, is to leave an artistic legacy in the form of a chapel to honor his family and be used by the public.

To that end he's hired famed Japanese architect Tadao Ando, who is known for using concrete to create minimalist, sensory spaces that meld into the landscape.

Ando has drawn a triangular-shaped chapel with glassed-in walls cantilevered out over a reflecting pool. The glass can retract to open the chapel to the air. The cross shown in the illustration is dangling from the ceiling by fine metal wires.

The site is on Seattle's Capitol Hill, overlooking Interlaken Park. In March, Ebsworth paid $6 million for the 3.7-acre lot. It's the former home of the late James Ray, whom I featured in a column two weeks ago for willing his $78 million fortune to a quirky foundation supporting musicians, kids, animals and mystical thinkers.

That Ebsworth now wants to build his chapel in Seattle will be welcome news to many in Bellevue, who fought it ferociously when he tried to put it in the Bridle Trails neighborhood last year.

Many neighbors fretted about traffic, though the chapel would seat only 140. But mostly they resented the premise, wondering: Who is this guy? And where does he get off putting a shrine in our neighborhood?

"Perhaps if Mr. Ebsworth wishes to build a memorial to himself, he should consider doing it in his own very exclusive neighborhood and leave us be," wrote Marjorie Jones of Bellevue, in a letter to the city.

Others called it a "vanity temple" for a "rich guy from Hunts Point." Ebsworth lives in a $20 million, 9,400-square-foot mansion on Lake Washington.

The chapel design includes six burial sites and a memorial garden for Ebsworth's family, which led one letter writer to dub it "an expensive personal cemetery."

"Nobody accepted it as a gift to our community," says Drew Smith, a Bridle Trails neighbor. "It was 100 percent opposition."

Ebsworth was trying to get a conditional use permit in Bellevue when he bought the Capitol Hill property. Now he needs a similar permit from Seattle.

A friend, Gerry Porter, says Ebsworth genuinely intends the chapel to be "an artistic gift to his adopted city."

"He's a very unassuming, gentle person who has enjoyed great wealth, and now wants to leave a work of architecture that's on a par with the city's great buildings, like the new Seattle Public Library," Porter says. "He wants it to be one of the things people come to Seattle to see."

He said it will be similar in "feeling and mood" to The Chapel of St. Ignatius at Seattle University, which, to me, is one of Seattle's few stunning pieces of architecture.

Porter, a retired reverend, said there would be Episcopal services at the Ebsworth chapel, but it would also be open to "any person as a place for quiet meditation and contemplation." The chapel would have a pipe organ, an eight-voice professional choir and parking for 75 cars.

He wouldn't say what it would cost. Last year Ebsworth told a community newspaper in Bellevue there was no budget but it could reach "$10 million to $20 million" or higher.

Porter says it isn't true that nobody wants this gift. He said it's been discussed with arts and civic leaders, such as the heads of the Seattle Art Museum and the Frye Art Museum, who are very enthusiastic about it.

Some neighbors on Capitol Hill already are dubious, however. They've never heard of Ebsworth. The project team has met with only three families near the site.

I can't tell you much about Ebsworth's motivations. He chose not to talk to me. Porter said Ebsworth "doesn't trust the press because he's had some bad experiences."

Fair enough. As it happens, Northwesterners are skeptical folks, too. We're leery of displays of wealth. And religion. And newcomers (I still qualify as one, even though I first arrived here 21 years ago).

Architecturally, this sounds like a cool project to me. But I don't live on Capitol Hill.

And my bet is Barney Ebsworth's going to have a hard time getting people there to accept his unusual gift unless he makes himself less of a stranger.

Danny Westneat's column appears Thursday and Sunday. Reach him at 206-464-2086 or dwestneat@seattletimes.com.