You know we had to add one more category for folks who are hard to categorize! If you hadn’t caught on by now, community is the engine driving so much of Seattle’s art. The city has a long, unruly tradition of artists deciding that if the institution they need doesn’t exist, they’ll just build it themselves. Our history of artist-run spaces, grassroots organizations, DIY venues, and iconoclastic experiments runs rich and deep: and/or, SOIL, CoCA, 911 Media Arts, On the Boards, Consolidated Works, the Vera Project—to name just a few—are all part of the blueprint. Here are some of the people who continue to show that often all it takes is one restless poet, derelict storefront, or Instagram account to spark the kind of movements that keep our cultural ecosystem resilient and perpetually capable of surprise.
Common Area Maintenance & Common Objects
Common Area Maintenance has a new writers’ program through their newer space, Common Objects, and it is THE PLACE to find connection to the writing scene in this city. No matter your experience level, genre(s) of interest, or anything else, Common Objects is where writers connect and hang out, work, listen, and play. Come for the bookstore, the clothing swaps, the gallery, the events.
You probably heard that earlier this year CAM negotiated a landmark deal to purchase the El Rey, a historic landmark building in Belltown slated for demolition. Thanks to their diligence and advocacy, now it’s become an extension of CAM, serving the evolving and critical needs of Seattle artists, like affordable space for gathering, for performances, for events, for classes, and for housing. What’s happening at CAM, Common Objects, and the El Rey has been a salve for the spirit in a post-pandemic landscape that has caused many to lose faith in our city’s institutions. CAM stays standing, a beacon of hope.
For this, we have to thank the many members of the community whose combined efforts—strategy, management, time, money, admin—made it a reality.
Over the years, Whitney Bashaw, Amy Hirayama, Jane Wong, and so many others alongside CAM founder Timothy Firth have helped make these spaces what they are today.
Dujie Tahat, our Seattle Civic Poet, has facilitated conversations with Mayor Katie Wilson at Common Objects. Eric Acosta, founder of unpoetry, worked onsite for weeks creating art during his fire watch residency, while he kept an eye on the El Rey overnight. We can’t wait to see what’s next. KATIE LEE ELLISON
Most places in this city want something from you. A Resting Place, tucked away in the CID, just wants you to sit down. Its creator, Derek Dizon, describes it as a community center for people who have experienced loss, but I think that undersells what he’s pulled off: an open, free, no-strings-attached community space in the center of Chinatown where grief gets to take up space in public.
He of all people understands what such a space requires. Dizon is a queer Filipino American artist and grief therapist, with over a decade of experience with anti-violence work at API Chaya. He is also a survivor of homicide loss. In creating A Resting Place, he built the room he himself needed and left the door open for others to join. Entering from the bustle of the block and the chaos of the city, this space truly feels like a refuge: it’s soft and cozy, inviting in the same way your couch is after a long day’s work. When I first visited, I planted myself in a seat and took it all in. A sizable library with dozens of books to help navigate grief and loss, beautiful wood furniture keeping the space warm, altars teeming with photos of loved ones, and hundreds of handwritten notes grieving visitors have pinned to the walls. This space represents so much of what Dizon holds dear and knows to be critical to personal and collective health: the understanding that grief deserves a no-cost space to exist, and that those experiencing grief should have a soft place to land. With so many spots that feel “Seattle” going by the wayside, it’s more important than ever to patronize and support the kind of community work that people like Dizon have built for us on King Street. MICHAEL WONG
Sean Herrera/Emerald City Tile Club
In 2026, in the city of Seattle no less, I consider assembling hundreds of cool kids in a gathering space twice a month a heroic act, period. But to center mahjong? Next-level. And Sean Herrera, the proprietor of the Emerald City Tile Club (ECTC), knows he’s brewing something important at his biweekly gatherings at Stoup Brewing. He sees it when folks bring their friends and make new ones, or when people bring their dates or even their physical therapist—all to play games of mahjong.
When his parents, Tita Cherrie and Tito Beboy, traveled all the way from Herrera’s childhood hometown of Clanton, Alabama, to witness the fruits of his labors, he saw it. Having visited for a number of the nights, I saw it. What makes it most special is less the event itself than the atmosphere Herrera has curated. On any given ECTC evening, you’ll see the coolest Asian kids you know swirling tiles with OGs from Chinatown, or line cooks from your favorite shop gathering to play.
Half the people in attendance don’t know a thing about the game, and the other half are eager to teach. At moment of peak AI slop, the analog nature of Herrera’s welcoming mahjong nights feels truly radical.
It’s exactly what Seattle needs right now, and I can’t help but get excited about whatever Herrera does next. MICHAEL WONG
In music retail, trying to be all things to all people usually consigns businesses to history’s dustbin. The owners of Lake City’s Hex Enduction Records & Books figured that out a while ago, and now they’re approaching seven years of peddling exactly what they want to music and literature aficionados who value non-mainstream art. Owners Dean Whitmore, Gabi Page-Fort, and Tom Ojendyk have discovered that a retailer—if their aesthetics are righteous enough and their instincts savvy enough—can thrive simply by selling merchandise in which they 100 percent believe. What a concept.
But beyond being one of Seattle’s most interesting music and literature retailers, Hex Enduction is a bona fide multimedia empire, albeit one on a shoestring budget. It has expanded its reach to include publishing books and a quarterly zine, releasing records, hosting live music and readings/author interviews, and serving as a gallery for local artists. The guiding principles behind Hex Enduction, as Whitmore related in a 2019 interview with The Stranger, are “representing artists that we love and respect. Primarily underground artists, local artists, forgotten artists, and artists operating on the margins. I’m hoping the shop will be a great place for music discovery and not just a place to pick up things that you already know you like. But we have some staples, as well.” Those values continue to guide Hex Enduction.
For people of rarefied sensibilities, Hex Enduction’s stock is dangerously seductive and likely to inspire splurges. But it feels damned good to drop your money in an establishment that prioritizes cultural enlightenment and human interaction over profit. Hex Enduction is the antidote to soulless capitalism. DAVE SEGAL
Bellingham-based writer, illustrator, artist, and designer Phoebe Wahl has made children’s books cool again. Her self-illustrated picture books tackle important, yet overlooked topics like gentrification (The Blue House), the natural life cycle (Sonya’s Chickens), hidden worlds (Backyard Fairies), and anti-capitalist self-care (Little Witch Hazel). Not only are these works invaluable for shaping young minds, her illustrations are vivid and inviting, enveloping readers of all ages in her worlds filled with magic and love.
In 2023, Wahl released her first work of young adult fiction, Phoebe’s Diary. Based on her teenage diary, the partially illustrated novel chronicles a young Phoebe mavigating friendships, crushes, insecurities, and consuming a potent weed brownie at senior prom. This book would have changed everything for me if I had read it as a teenager. Wahl depicts the life of teens with radical honesty and vulnerability, and she doesn’t skimp on the messy parts—it’s as much about the selfishness of young adulthood as it is about creativity and growth. Earlier this year, Wahl entered the performance sphere, adapting Little Witch Hazel into a live show with original music, dancing, painted sets, and handmade puppets. During a time of rapidly changing technology, Wahl understands and embraces the need for DIY productions. She told the Cascadia Daily News, “We wanted this to be something that needed to be made by hand and needed to be experienced in person.” She continued, “In that way, it is a political show; in that making handmade art and clinging onto our humanness right now is a political act.” AUDREY VANN
Where would we be without Vanishing Seattle? In a city that’s always on its way to becoming something else, Vanishing Seattle has become a space for collective mourning and remembering. Seattle’s many ghosts float through its Instagram posts full of photos, signage, art, and memorabilia from beloved venues, businesses, and cultural touchpoints, reminding us that spaces are about more than just their four walls. They are also capsules of community, and of the kinds of connection and experiences that make living in a city worthwhile.
One would be justified in imagining that Vanishing Seattle is powered by a fleet of historians, researchers, and pigeons carrying messages across the city, but really it’s just one woman who grew up here before a latte was $10: Cynthia Brothers. Since its 2016 inception as a humble Instagram account, Vanishing Seattle has grown into a business that has produced a film series, two books (with a third on the way), numerous podcast appearances, guided city walks (some with author Taha Ebrahimi, see pg. 63), variety shows, a line of merch, and more. The animating force is not a preserved-in-amber nostalgia with a preservationist cast, but Brothers’s fierce love for the city that acknowledges its many moods and expressions. It’s full of celebration, too—periodic “Not Vanishing” posts spotlight community stalwarts that have survived, as well as beloved landmarks like Pike Place Market.
It’s easy to complain about the things in Seattle you don’t like and moan about how it used to be so much better. More challenging, and far more interesting, is to remember what made certain spaces so magical and to carry that magic forward into new creations. We’re always dying and being reborn; Vanishing Seattle helps us remember where we’ve been. BESS LOVEJOY
