What to Do in Seattle Center (that park where the Space Needle is)

Seattle Center is the most popular park in Seattle for obvious reasons. There is a lot to do and see so let us give you our tips on what check out. 

Space Needle 

This one doesn't need much introduction. The Space Needle is the most visited place in Seattle and it's a tad bit noticeable as a 605 foot tall Jetson-esque shaped tower. The Space Needle was built for the 1962 World's Fair in Seattle.

Insider tip: Adult tickets are $22 to visit the Observation Deck or you can take a trip up to SkyCity, the rotating restaurant at the top, and for a $35 food/drink minimum get access to the observation deck and delicious food! 

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Chihuly Garden & Glass

We did an entire post on Chihuly Garden & Glass because it is AMAZING! Dale Chihuly is a pretttyy famous glassblower from Tacoma, WA (Washington is full of the most talented people). This museum in Seattle Center is a tribute to his beautiful work. Even if you aren't a "museum person" give this one a shot, we think you'll be impressed...like super duper impressed. 

Insider tip: Save big bucks and get a dual access ticket for $36 to visit Chihuly Garden and Glass and the Space Needle.

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MoPOP!

Museum of Pop Culture - MoPOP

MoPOP (previously EMP) is made for the cool pop culture fans out there. They basically cover everything that is awesome about pop culture and nothing else. Exhibits highlight Horror and Science Fiction films, the Grunge Era, and obviously, the Seahawks epic Super Bowl win. And don't get too excited, but they have a David Bowie exhibit coming in 2017. We think this goes without saying, but no Kardashians allowed. 

Insider tip: Check out Campout Cinema. Their movie screen is MASSIVE and their movie nights are so cool! Camp out in a huge room with LED stars above you and watch cool movies. 

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Pacific Science Center 

The science center is an interactive museum for people of all ages. Seriously, even the exhibits you can tell they made for kids, we love. The have a butterfly house and exhibits that teach you about dinosaurs, medical science, and earth's atmosphere. Best yet, the IMAX theater is located here and it plays all the best movies that will blow your mind because... IMAX.

Insider tip: There are some giant flowers outside the Pacific Science Center. They are more than flowers, it's an art exhibit called Sonic Boom. When it's sunny hang out beneath them and wait for them to soak up enough solar power to start playing their echo-y songs! 

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Key Arena 

This is where Beyonce comes when she visits Seattle. I think that sells itself.

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Teatro Zinzanni

The dinner show of all dinner shows. Teatro Zinzanni never disappoints. It has everything...comedy, acrobats, singing, dancing, cabaret, audience participation, and magic. Your ticket includes a 5-course meal, a three hour show, and a whole bunch of entertainment (even the servers get in on the dancing). The show rotates constantly, so you can keep go back and experiencing new performances. It is expensive (tickets range from $89 - $173 depending on your seat in relation to the stage), but we definitely recommend checking it out at least once.

Insider tip: Your ticket does not include any alcohol or gratuity, and they automatically add $6 per person to your bill for gratuity. You can bring you own wine to the show (if it's not on their menu) for a $20 corkage fee.

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The Bill and Melinda Gates Visitor Center

Across the street from the EMP are the offices of The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. For those of you not aware, Bill Gates started this small company, Microsoft, and then made like 1 gillion dollars and now puts a lot of that money toward helping others. This visitor center is free and showcases all of the cool stuff they are doing. Think inventing new ways to teach children to ensure they never fall behind in school and eradicating diseases worldwide. They are awesome, go get inspired.

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Seattle Repertory Theater 

This is a small theater that creates a incredible lineup of shows every year. It has two stages, and since it is smaller in size every seat is a good one! We have seen several shows here and they have all been phenomenal. 

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Pacific Northwest Ballet 

It's a ballet. We aren't ballet experts, but we think this one is pretty up to standard. Beautiful dancers, beautiful costumes, beautiful stories. Oh, and The Nutcracker starts this week so if you haven't been now is a good time to start! 

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Seattle Monorail 

To be honest, the monorail doesn't have much of a purpose for locals, but it is a cool thing to ride as a visitor. This was built with the Space Needle for the 1962 Worlds Fair and you can ride from Seattle Center to Westlake. You get great views of the Space Needle and get this, it goes THROUGH MoPOP, which is really cool. Also, Frasier and Niles rode it in a special anniversary episode of Frasier. 

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The Armory 

The Seattle Center Armory is where you go when you are hungry after all your sightseeing. It houses over 15 restaurants ranging from Mexican, to Japanese, to American, to Starbucks (yes that is a category of food here). It has also public restrooms. Take note. 

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The Tallest Drinks in Seattle

The Smith Tower's Temperance

The Smith Tower got a facelift this year! For those of you who haven't been to the new and improved Observation Deck yet, we highly recommend it. Along with the all-time favorites like the lever-operated elevator, The Wishing Chair, and the incredible views at the top, the experience now includes a much higher amount of educational content and a speakeasy style bar! Seems so obvious now that the space was always missing a bar, how did we not figure this out sooner?!

The staff was incredibly friendly and helped us land on a delicious cocktail named Serenity for our drinking pleasure. In true speakeasy fashion it was strong, but good. And you can sip it in comfy chairs as the sun sets on Seattle. It really is a beautiful space with a wonderful view.

The Smith Tower is 35 stories tall (462 ft.), placing it in 3rd place on the list. It might not be the tallest, but something about standing amid all the buildings that have sprung up since 1914 is pretty magical. 

Space Needle's SkyCity

SkyCity is the high-end, rotating restaurant at the top of the Space Needle. The restaurant is the shape of a donut, wrapped around the Space Needle right beneath the observation deck. When you exit the elevator you are led to a table along the outer edge; definitely try to get a table against the window -- watching the city circle below you is a ton of fun! When you eat/drink at SkyCity you also get complimentary access to the Space Needle's observation deck, so make sure to factor in time to head up before or after dining.

At over 500 ft. tall, SkyCity sits in second place on our list of tallest drinks in Seattle! 

Insider Tip: Going to SkyCity does comes with a food and beverage minimum. Dinner is a tad pricey at $35/person, but they have a promotion right now for Sunset Hour with a lower minumum of $25. For comparison a ticket to just the observation deck is $22, so we think this is the way to visit the Space Needle! From 2:30 - 5:30, Monday - Friday, you can go to the top, have a drink while the sun goes down over the city, and visit the observation deck. It ends December 16, 2016 though so hurry on over! 

Columbia Center's Sky View Observatory

Columbia Tower is the tallest building in our skyline and also has the highest observation deck in Seattle (we covered it here). Your ears will pop as you ride the elevator up to the 73rd floor. When you arrive, you will be granted beautiful 360-degree views of the entire area and this is the only observation deck that includes unobstructed views of the Space Needle and the floating 520 bridge. On clear days you can see as far as Mount Hood in Oregon. 

Their cafe/bar is a bit lacking compared to the other places on this list. It's the Panera Bread to the Space Needle's McCormick and Schmick's. But, they have local beer and wine and happy hour, which is exactly what we were looking for when we visited after work at 5:00 PM. We sipped on a Naughty Nellie from Pike Brewing Company and a red blend from Chateau Ste. Michelle.

At 900 ft. this is the tallest you can be in the city while sipping on an adult beverage! 

The Tallest Geographic Point- 35th and Myrtle

Well what do you know? The tallest geographic point in the city is not in Queen Anne, it is in West Seattle in the Delrigde neighborhood at 35th and Myrtle St. We wouldn't recommend drinking here though (do as we say not as we do), as the city frowns upon opening beers on street corners, but we found a really great bar, The Westy, nearby where you can enjoy a nice taplist along with wine and cocktails.

This one is obviously a bit off trend from our previous three, but we thought it would be a fun one to include-- now you know a little piece of Seattle trivia! 

Standing at the tallest geographical point in Seattle!

Alright folks. That concludes our drinking in tall places post. it was random. It was fun. We raise our glass to you for reading Rain or Shine's recommendations! 

Cheers!

Bettie Page House (now with a friend!)

For the last decade, Seattle commuters have been able to admire the beautiful Bettie Page as they make their way to and from Seattle's downtown and now, we can thank the owners of this Ravenna home for a new addition: Divine. 

Bettie Page (what a hottie, right?!) has been eyeing us for so long she seems like she must have always been painted two stories high on the side of I-5. But, alas, her story only began in 2006 when home owner Chris Brugos asked a friend, John Green, to add a little color to his home, even if it was in black and white. Bettie Page emerged after a lot of hours of work and is now a signature of Seattle, representing the openness of Seattle and the openness Bettie Page represented, far before her time. 

Sadly, in June Bettie was vandalized. The vandals stating feminism as their cause (yes...because that makes sense...vandalize a beautiful woman expressing herself openly...great logic. <---that was sarcasm). But the homeowners were not deterred; they brought Bettie back to her original spender and have given her a friend whose image is equally powerful: Divine. Divine was given the title "Drag Queen of the Century" and has been a powerful figure in the LGBT community. 

These ladies are killing it up there and that is saying something. We're not sure we could pull off the siding look. 

All joking aside, we love this house and hope that the community continues to support this art. It makes our city a better place! 

Seattle's Famous Film Locations

We are always a little bitter when we excitedly sit down to watch a new show or movie set in Seattle and we see Vancouver, BC buildings and public transport show up in the scenes. It is decidedly cheaper to film in Canada, so most production companies take the discount thinking Seattle and Vancouver are basically interchangeable. Throw in a shot of the Space Needle and you're good, right? 

Nope. Because we know. And we are loyal to our city.

So, let's pay homage to the films and TV shows that spent the cash and used real Seattle locations to film. Let's take a little tour around Seattle to find all the spots in various movies and shows.

TV

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Frasier's tour around Seattle. Top Left: Famous "Public Market" sign at Pike Place Market, Top Right: Space Needle, Bottom Left: Pike Place Fish, Bottom Right: Riding the Monorail

Frasier

We are letting them on this list, but just barely. 99.9% of Fraser was filmed on a set in L.A but for one special episode they came and shot in Seattle. They make it on the list because they hit up all the big hitters in 20 minutes, which is pretty amazing. In Season 5, Episode 5, you can see The Space Needle, the Monorail, and Pike Place Market including Pike Place Fish and Don and Joe's Meats.

Meredith Grey's house from Grey's Anatomy located in Queen Anne. Photo Credit

Greys Anatomy

Again, most of this show was shot on a set in L.A., but they do use a couple of genuine Seattle locations in the show! Fisher Plaza, home of KOMO News, is used to represent some of the hospital shots, and Meredith's Queen Anne home is a real house located at 303 W. Comstock St. in the Queen Anne neighborhood.

MOVIES

The Singles apartment complex located in Capitol Hill

Singles (1992)

This cult classic brings together everything Seattleites want in a film: music, love, and a good coffee shop. Plus that HAIR and alllll the flannel and a young Eddie Vedder! It also takes in a lot of Seattle over the 99 minute long picture. Occidental Park in Pioneer Square is the site where Kyra Sedgwick and Campbell Scott take a stroll. Scott eats a meal at Chandler's Crabhouse. They visit Seattle famous dive bars Re-Bar and El Corazon for concerts and they live in an apartment complex in Capitol Hill (totally where they would live if this was a true story). You also get to see Gasworks Park again (filmmakers love Gasworks, huh?)!

Tom Hank's Lake Union floating house in Sleepless in Seattle

Sleepless in Seattle (1993)

Seattle's favorite film. Don't argue, this is Seattle's favorite film. We love this movie and no one can take it away from us. Tom Hanks is a movie god, and he walked around our city to film this movie, so it is the best Seattle movie. Period. You can see a lot of the places from this film. The Baldwin's house boat still sits on Lake Union and looks exactly the same. You can take a boat tour to see it or our preferred method is to rent a kayak and paddle over. (Agua Verde is a good option). 

Sit your butt in the same stool that Tom Hanks sat in at The Athenian in Pike Place Market.

You can also plant your butt in the same seat as Tom Hanks at The Athenian. This is the restaurant Sam Baldwin (Hanks) gets lunch with his friend Ray. You also spot other Pike Place Market landmarks like the fish market and Inn at the Market as they walk to The Athenian. 

The famous paint ball course at Gasworks Park in 10 Things I Hate About You

10 Things I Hate About You (1999)

Now Sleepless in Seattle might reign #1 for Seattle films, but let's be honest, it was a littttttttle creepy. 10 Things I Hate About You is a much more accurate and realistic love story. And it is when we all first fell in love with Heath Ledger, so brooding, so misunderstood, he just wanted someone to play paintball with! 

The Fremont Troll where Joseph Gordon Levitt filmed

This movie has our favorite Seattle spotting, the Fremont Troll. Young and still dorky Joseph Gordon Levitt has a hormone filled conversation with his love interest Bianca (such a 90s name).

Gasworks Park also makes an appearance when Heath and Julia have a crazy game of paintball, although we don't think that giant paintball course has ever been open to the public. And their prom is filmed at The Paramount Theatre, Balllllerrrrr! 

Left: I-90 Bridge, Right: Chihuly Garden and Glass

Laggies (2014)

We still can't decide if we liked this movie or not..but if you hate it you still get some decent Seattle shots. Chihuly Garden and Glass makes an appearance as a wedding venue. You really can rent this for a wedding, it costs $-- or your first born child, one or the other.

You also get a very pretty shot of the I-90 floating bridge since the main character (Knightley) lives on the Eastside.

Say Anything (1989)

Corey's house is real!! Gosh we love when this happens! It is in Ballard, located at 6507 Parker Court Northwest, Seattle, WA 98117.

Bob's Java Jive from Say Anything is a bit worn down these days

Bob's Java Jive in Tacoma makes a drive-by appearance in Say Anything. Today this is a super strange coffee shop turned bar. We don't recommend it as a place to go unless we really hate the person. 

Waiting for Interurban. Photo by Xurxo Martinez

You can also catch a glimpse of the statue 'Waiting for the Interurban', a local favorite located in Fremont, Seattle, when Diane is on her way to graduation. On graduation day in Seattle this statue could very probably be decorated in the exact same manner.