The first time I heard "brakes and bikes" i was extremely impressed by Mallery's ability, as a Seattle native, to write about the unique youth culture of this place from an inside-out perspective. The main characters in this play are hipsters who are not really hip anymore...but they are trying to hold on to their cultural identity. They are holding on to the grittiness, the artsyness, the "fuck you"ness of the Seattle art-kid scene despite their inherent need to grow up and out, holding on to the glamor of Capitol Hill and the power of the mountains to the point where they become docile and make decisions that they KNOW they're smarter than, because the rain and the cigarettes and the booze and meaningless sex makes them feel futile, burnt out, lost, and bored. But that is the way things are in this place. You can never be drunk enough, you can never be "fucking" too many people, you can never be cool enough. I had to leave the city for Chicago for money-reasons, but i genuinely believe that, if i had stayed in Seattle after attending Cornish, I would have probably ended up a lot like Drew.. Seattle is the perfect place to go to art school, but it is difficult to be inspired to actually make art on your own (for me at least), because of all the temptation to lean into self indulgence. With all the pressure to be "unique", no one gets anything done.
So with that, I present you with my blog- a retrospect of my experience living in Seattle as a hip young thing, with hopes that you will all be able to feel better acquainted with this beautiful, dangerous, iconic city.
THE THREE THINGS YOU HAVE TO BE INTO TO BE COOL IN SEATTLE
1) COFFEE AND CIGARETTES
not one or the other, but both together. To want a lot of caffiene and nicotene, you must be slightly depressed. Some people think that this emotion is brought on so often in Seattlites by the cloudy, rainy weather. But I blame it more on the overall "grunge" scene. You have to be depressed. If you're not slightly depressed, you're not cool enough to mingle with the gorgeous musician guys and the angry-faced tattoo'd hot chicks with dreds who are clad in clothes from
2) THRIFT STORES
if anything you wear is new, you're an asshole. Even your shoes should be bought second hand. You should either be wearing converse or combat boots, both preferably scuffed and dirty. There are cheap secondhand stores, like Value Village and Goodwill, which carry gems like ironic tweety-bird t-shirts and old man sweaters, and although they are cheap and awesome they can sometimes smell like poo and cause you to have to shop next to a homeless person who calls you names. If you want a slightly better quality shopping experience but still want incredibly trendy clothes you can go to trade-shops like Buffalo Exchange and Crossroads. At places like this, you can exchange last years Ray-Bans (a gift from Grandma.. who would ever spend more than $10 for sunglasses?) for some American Apparel hoodies and maybe a pair of Stella McCartney cowboy boots, (note: a true Seattle kid would never pay more than $20 for American Apparel or Stella McCartney, although a Chicago or New York hipster definitley tries to look for the best new clothes, a Seattle hipster wants things to be a little old, a little worn, with a few holes and some history). These places are my personal favorite, because you can get current fashion finds (soft flannel shirts, high waisted skirts, etc) for a fraction of the price they were selling for at Urban Outfitters 2 years ago, but if you are a true Seattle hipster you are looking further than that, looking for things that were cool in the 70's and never again, things that your mom wore when she was young and cool but wouldnt be caught dead in today. Polyester, shoulder pads, the whole nine yards. The Fremont Vintage Mall and stores like Red Light and Atlas specialize in vintage clothes, things that you see being replicated in Urban Outfitters because real hipsters in Seattle are wearing them, but the prices are way higher than their modern day homages at Urban. For $70 at Red Light, you can get the coolest looking dress, truly vintage from the 1960's, and that is the ONLY time it is okay to spend $70 on ANYTHING.
ANYONE WHO SHOPS AT URBAN OUTFITTERS IS AN ASSHOLE,
unless their rich mom paid for it, which makes it okay, and also it is very important that, if this person IS wearing Urban Outfitters clothes, they have a record player at home and a lot of old vintage records. Which brings me to my third rule. You must be into
3) DAVID BOWIE
for some reason, the powerful androgynous hero is the biggest influence of anyone you meet in Seattle. A famously homo-friendly city, you will find drag queens everywere, even working at Starbucks, more boys wearing makeup than girls, and glitter in the hair of many. But David Bowie is popular with everyone. If you don't like Bowie, or T-Rex, or any of their contemporaries, you clearly have no taste in music. It's good to watch many Wes Anderson movies and acquaint yourself with the soundtracks. Generally the more obscure your music taste, the better, but if you are hosting a party and you DON'T play "Suffergette City", you are an asshole. I thought maybe this was just an art school thing, but then i worked at the PINNACLE of Seattle Hipster Food Places, a "sustainable sandwich shop" called Homegrown, and whenever Bowie came on over the radio they would turn it up and dance their understated, beanie wearing heads off.
THIS is Timothy Rysdyke. He is SO Seattle. I met him in an elevator my first year in Seattle. He is an amazing hipster-homo, one of Seattle's best fosho, and he is also a photographer for The Stranger who has a great photoblog where you can check out many different faces of current Seattle Coolness. Our very important playwright is featured on it, too!! CHECK IT
http://www.hillebrity.com/
He photographs mainly people who live in Capitol Hill, which is the neighborhood where Drew and Jason live, as well as all the cool kids (i lived there for 4 years).
CAPITOL HILL
is one of the many "hills" in Seattle. Seattle is built into the hills, because when it was all built at sealevel it was flooded multiple times by the always testy Puget Sound. Capitol Hill is carved into the heart of Seattle, just up a steep hill from Downtown and close to South Lake Union. "the Hill", as locals refer to it, is rife with bars, coffee shops, cheap(ish) apartments, vintage and thrift stores, and has a similar vibe to Wicker Park and Logan Square. There are young people everywhere but also resedential streets with beautiful old mansions and families with babies and dogs galore. There are parks, forests, and streets lined with Pho (vietnamese noodle soup, very popular in the Northwest) shops, donuts, coffee stands, smoke shops, dispensaries, bars, bars, bars, taco stands, hot dog stands, sex shops, thai restaurants, hamburger joints.
All of the cool kids live on the hill. Many, many people refuse to leave it even after they have been everywhere it has to offer thousands of times, gone to all the parties until there remains no love not triangled, smoked all of the strains of all of the weed, climbed up on all of the roofs. This is why you see the same iconic people everyday, without fail; the homeless artist who sells his art in front of Dicks, the dirt-cheap hamburger stand that is open til 2am, the crazy woman who walks around with a pee-wee-herman marionette, the gauged-ear'd jeans vest clad "bad boys" with cigarettes hanging out of their mouths who stand in front of the Egyptian movie theater waiting for hipster dreamgirls to see the midnight movie with, the ice cream boy with pony hair and ironic polyester shirts.
Here is the best map of Seattle I found.
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