After work on friday Amanda and I took a look at a live/work space in the Old Rainier Brewery in Seattle’s SODO neighborhood. Later in the evening we found ourselves at a party in that same neighborhood that centered on a large interactive art installation. Then today I spent the first part of today sitting in a booth at the Fremont Outdoor market where Amanda was selling some of her craft stuff.
The common thread here is that there seem to be some neighborhoods that lend themselves to creativity more than others. For example now I’m sitting in our lovely apartment in Eastlake and i couldn’t tell you where the closest piece of public art is.
Naturally the people make the neighborhood. SODO gets all kinds of cool stuff because land is relatively inexpensive and it’s not considered a desirable place to live. As such lots of creative types that want to live in the city end up doing their creative things there.
Fremont was once a center of art and culture in Seattle, and arguably still is. But it’s the kind of neighborhood that was recognized for it’s quirky support of creative types which then attracted all kinds of other people to water down the culture.
Anyway, next time we move (which will hopefully be soon), I’ll be picking the location based on the creative energy around me.
