Skykomish Hotel

The Skykomish Hotel was built in 1904 in the small Cascade Mountain railroad town of Skykomish, Washington, in King County, in the wake of a fire that devastated the community that year. Constructed at a cost of roughly $10,000, the four-story frame building was an ambitious establishment for a frontier town, featuring chandeliers, a fireplace, a restaurant, and a combined gambling room and bar. In an era of railroad workers, miners, and frontier travelers, the hotel served as both lodging and a center of entertainment.

In its early decades the hotel reflected the rough character of a remote railroad town, with its upper floor associated in local memory with gambling, drinking, and, by tradition, a brothel and speakeasy. As Skykomish's fortunes declined with changes in the railroad industry, the hotel gradually fell into disuse.

The building stood neglected and largely vacant for many years. It was reclaimed by the Town of Skykomish and, in 2010, was named to the Washington Trust for Historic Preservation's Most Endangered Places list, later updated to a status of 'Saved.' Renovation efforts have been pursued, including work supported by a 4Culture grant, though the building has remained vacant and is not currently operating as a hotel or bed-and-breakfast.

Today the Skykomish Hotel survives as one of the most prominent historic structures in its tiny mountain town, a tangible reminder of the early-twentieth-century railroad era in the Cascades.