[5] The Rainier Club was first proposed at a February 23, 1888 meeting of six Seattle civic leaders; it was formally incorporated July 25, 1888.

[10] The club's first home was in part of James McNaught's Fourth Avenue 22-room mansion[3][11] (on the site of today's Seattle Central Library[12]).

McNaught was happy to have a tenant: he was moving to St. Paul, Minnesota to take a position as chief counsel for the Northern Pacific Railroad.

[15] After a brief period there, from February 1893, the clubhouse was located in rooms at the then newly erected Seattle Theatre, on the site of today's Arctic Building.

[14][16] The Rainier Club purchased its current property at Fourth Avenue and Columbia Street in downtown Seattle in 1903.

[5][12] Seattle architect Carl F. Gould added the south wing in 1929, plus a Georgian-style entry and interior Art Deco ornamentation.

In Walter Crowley's words, "This policy was notably silent on members' possession of alcohol..."[19] The Rainier Club was not exempt from the Great Depression.

Most notably, Eddie Carlson, President of Western International Hotels (later Westin), was prime mover of the fair, and most organizing meetings were held at the clubhouse.

[5] In 1993, U.S. president Bill Clinton held two Asian Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) ministerial meetings with Japan and China at the Rainier Club.

[12] Besides the members, prominent visitors to the clubhouse have included John Philip Sousa, Buffalo Bill Cody, William Howard Taft, Lt. General Arthur MacArthur, General Douglas MacArthur, Babe Ruth, Rear Admiral Robert E. Peary, and the members of the early (1893–1911) Japanese trade delegations to the United States.