Building issues and lost leases abruptly darken Capitol Hill block home to Rione XIII, Rubinstein Bagels, and Bar Vacilando

The crumbling bricks of a 1922-era Capitol Hill building appear to be part of the story behind the sudden closure of three neighboring 15th Ave E businesses.

The corner’s Rione XIII Italian restaurant and its sibling Rubinstein Bagels shop are closed immediately. Bar Vacilando, which just marked its tenth year on 15th Ave E, will close this weekend.

“We can confirm Bar Vacilando’s last day is this Saturday,” a spokesperson for the hangout said and provided a statement on the shutdown:

We are deeply grateful to every employee who helped shape Vacilando, and to every guest, neighbor, friend, and regular who spent time with us. Thank you for giving this place a life. We are grateful we were able to serve you over the years.

A person familiar with operations at the Italian restaurant and bagel shop of the Ethan Stowell-helmed One House Hospitality restaurant group confirmed the immediate closures with CHS and said that landlord and building issues were behind the lost leases.

“Unfortunately, ongoing issues with the building have made it so we can no longer continue operating in this space,” the company later said in a statement.

The simultaneous endings will darken a corner of a street already challenged by closures and the paused redevelopment of the neighborhood’s QFC. The grocery is coming up on six years since it was axed by parent company Kroger.

On the other side of the street, the long ago Piggly Wiggly grocery market building home to Rione XIII, Rubinstein Bagels, and Bar Vacilando has had a rough couple years capped off by a situation in August when crumbling bricks were reported along the structure’s E Harrison-side facade. According to a Code Compliance Complaint filed in early August, the matter had been referred to the city’s building inspections team but there have been no updates in the weeks since.

There have been other major problems afoot at the property.

According to King County tax records, the longtime family ownership behind the property has not paid taxes on the parcel since 2023 with over $135,000 owed through this year.

In Washington, prolonged tax issues coupled with abrupt lease terminations can signal issues including estate hurdles or ownership transitions to looming structural repair mandates the property cannot absorb. Older unreinforced masonry buildings face increasingly costly maintenance, and commercial leases typically allow landlords to terminate tenancy when mandated repairs become economically or structurally impractical.

It is not clear if there are legal, estate issues, or other matters behind the absence. A check of court and property records shows no active cases or major liens against the property.

The ownership’s holdings include the neighboring buildings home to neighborhood favorites Grandad’s Barber Shop — previously Tim’s/Jim’s — and Rainbow Natural Remedies but those structures, for now, seem to be free from the issues that led to the closures next door. Both Grandad’s and Rainbow say they are open for business.

15th Ave E’s current era of growth has been on pause as the old QFC block awaits a six-story redevelopment stalled along with major development across most of the Hill by high interest rates, inflation, and a suboptimal rental economy. In the meantime, groups like LOVECITYLOVE and the Punk Rock Flea Market are keeping the area busy. And small businesses like Sweet Mary’s Cherries are making temporary homes in the someday to be demolished buildings.

Still, the street is slowly changing. Major mixed use development the Hilltop Apartments building opened in 2024 on the site of the neighborhood’s former service station. Acrosss the street, the corner home to the liver damaging Canterbury Tavern is about to become home to a new spirit lifting MOOV fitness studio.

2026 has also left the former Ada’s Technical Books shuttered but new businesses are joining the area including a rebirth of Bar Cantinetta and delayed but still in motion plans for Fire Tacos & Cantina to join 15th in the old Coastal Kitchen building.

The latest new projects include Ha Ha Coffee — CHS visited here — and RUAM – Thai Bowls and Noodles. A Best Smoke & Vape Shop also recently opened on the street in a former office space.

Still, the closures at 15th and Harrison hurt and bring some long running staples and a pocket of neighborhood jobs to an abrupt end.

Rione XIII’s closure ends a 14-year-run for the Stowell “Roman trattoria” concept. His 2012 buildout of the space formerly home to the “difficult for children” boutique Tilden led the way in the longtime commercial building’s transition from retail to fully food and drink. Stowell’s restaurant group remains invested in Capitol Hill with a Tavolàta location on E Pike.

Rubinstein Bagels, meanwhile, launched what CHS called the golden age of Capitol Hill bagels when it opened in the former Wandering Goose space in 2021. Founder Andrew Rubinstein later parted ways with the Capitol Hill shop and the other RB locations, selling his interest to Stowell and exiting the partnership with the prolific restaurateur to focus on his own joint, Hey Bagel in the University Village mall. The Rubinstein Bagels locations in Eastlake, Redmond, and South Lake Union remain.

Capitol Hill’s golden age of bagels? Well, there is hope. “Seattle’s premier halal bagel cafe,” TOASTED is opening a Capitol Hill counter on E Pike. There are also newer additions like Mt. Bagel and a highly respected showing from the one and only Dingfelder’s which has grown from a popular walk-up into a full blown Jewish deli since its 2018 debut.

For Bar Vacilando, CHS marked a decade of the bar from the Black Bottle Group restaurant family this summer with a celebration of the space’s legendary patio.

And as for the old building, there is no current record of any construction plans or major changes. The city’s historical report for the property says, in addition to its years as a grocery, the corner also served as home to a furniture and appliance store, a TV shop, and even an evangelical church for a few years and that it remains and “unusually ornate and intact small commercial building.” Now, it has suddenly become much less intact with a past that seems much brighter than its immediate future.