Naked blue Fremont Solstice Parade tandem by Flickr user ebis50.
I don’t really intend to be the naked-cyclists-all-the-time blog. So even though today was Seattle’s Fremont Summer Solstice Fair, whose parade traditionally features a phalanx of naked, painted cyclists, I’ll keep the nudity to a minimum. Besides, I can’t rival Flickr photographers’ (like Dapperlad’s) photos of the parade, so I won’t even try. Hit Flickr for all the wonderfully creative cycles and art in this year’s parade.
Shirt by Slow Loris designs.
Still, I had to go! The annual Fremont Fair, held on solstice weekend, is a weird and wonderful way to officially start the summer.
As I strolled the booths of the fair, in between the guy dressed as a seven-foot penguin and playing a saxophone, and the naked bearded dude doing a fluorescent scarf dance by the main stage, I noticed what seems to be an uptick in the number of artists who are making shirts and clothing with simple screened designs on them. (And sometimes charging an arm and a leg for them – do people really pay $30 or more for a t-shirt with a simple one-color silkscreen on it?!) Anyway, it seemed there were at least ten booths of the simple-screened-designs-on-cotton-clothes variety, and several of them had neato bicycle designs.
These tops from from Bellingham’s Red Boots Design are groovy. Her clothes include lots with screens of bike-related line drawings; even more are featured on her website. (She’s also got roots in the Maritimes like me! W00t!)
I also really liked this mug, by Oregon potter Alissa Clark. Bikes and coffee, it’s a beautiful thing.
Happy solstice.
PS: “De Libertas Quirkas.” Freedom to be quirky. Unofficial motto of Seattle’s wonderful Fremont neighborhood, which is emblazoned on the iconic fifty three foot rocket at “the center of the unverse.”
