This article appears in print in the July 2018 issue. Click here to subscribe.

In recent years, the Georgetown Steam Plant (6605 13th Ave. S), built in 1906 and used to power Seattle intermittently over the years, hasn’t seen much action. (It was last used by its owner, Seattle City Light, in 1973.)

But the shuttered plant, a National Historic Landmark, will soon be in the spotlight when it stars in a graphic novel under development by Seattle-based illustrator David Lasky and writer and Washington native Mairead Case, a duo tapped by the Seattle Office of Arts and Culture and City Light to construct a fictionalized world revolving around the plant.

Lasky and Case are currently generating ideas and conducting research for storylines; when the novel is published next year by the Office of Arts and Culture, readers can expect roughly 200 pages of material that bring the defining features of the plant to life. Case says it will involve two main characters, Ida and Harry, who “grow to learn how amazing the plant is, and how different the community would be without it.” The book will be available for free in places such as local schools, libraries and museums, and Case hopes it will eventually be reprinted for sale to a wider audience. (Psst, Fantagraphics!)

Follow the artists’ creative process at steamplantgraphicnovel.com.