The Space Needle is possibly Seattle’s most famous landmark, featured in the logo of the television show Frasier, and dating from the 1962 Century 21 Exposition, a World’s Fair. The monorail constructed for the Exposition still runs today between Seattle Center and downtown. It will be torn down when the new, mass-transit monorail is built from Ballard through downtown to West Seattle.
Other famous landmarks include the Smith Tower, Pike Place Market (pictured), the Fremont Troll, the Experience Music Project and the new Seattle Central Library.
In 1981, Seattle held a contest to come up with a new official nickname. The winner, selected in 1982, was the Emerald City, a slogan submitted by Californian Sarah Sterling-Franklin, and referring to the lush surrounding nature due to the frequent rain. From 1869 to 1982, Seattle’s official nickname was the Queen City.
Seattle is sometimes referred to as the “rainy city”, even though it gets less rain than many other U.S. cities. It is also known as Jet City, due to the heavy influence of Boeing.
Seattle is known as the home of grunge music, has a reputation for heavy coffee consumption, and was the site of the 1999 meeting of the World Trade Organization shut down by anti-globalist demonstrators.
Seattle residents and people who come from Seattle are known as Seattleites.
