The Stranger

Cheer on your favorite team during the World Cup‘s third-place and final matches at this weekend’s World Soccer Fan Celebration in the U District. There’s more cheap fun to get up to at the Alki Art Fair, the Indian Days Powwow, and the Seattle Bon Odori Festival. For more ideas, check out our top picks of the week.

Trump Lies: Well, President Donald Trump’s speech on Thursday was a real doozy. He attacked elections. Citing heavily redacted intelligence documents out of context, Trump claimed that China interfered in the 2020 election by stealing millions of voter files on behalf of famed Chinese communist Joe Biden.

It took over three hours of debate in the Seattle City Council’s Select Committee on Seattle Transportation Benefit District, a slew of dumb amendments, a few good amendments, and sitting through Committee Chair Rob Saka’s tortured pronunciation of the word “machete,” but the Seattle Transit Measure (STM) is intact and headed to a full council vote next week. If it passes, the measure will go to the voters this August.

Get ready to rumble with tickets to these newly announced shows. Groovy genre-bending bassist Thundercat will come through Seattle to support his recent release, Distracted. Pop-rock singer-songwriter Michelle Branch has announced a new album and cross-country tour for the fall. Plus, Daily Show correspondent and former pro tennis player Michael Kosta brings his Big Dad Energy stand-up special to Seattle next spring.

My friend group and I attend drag shows and brunches year-round. For the most part, these shows are beautiful displays of queer art and joy, and are valued spaces for the Seattle queer community. In the past month, I have been to several shows where drunk straight people (yes, I’m assuming) had to be kicked out for talking over the performers, shit-talking the venue, and/or transphobic bullshit.

This story was originally published in The Stranger’s July 2026 print issue. Multidisciplinary artist and designer Shiloh Davies is looking to “bring a little more play into the everyday.” Their textile works—which include soft sculptures, costume designs, and installations—are fantastical, surreal, and full of childlike whimsy. Whether it’s large pancakes stacked along a wall, giant pastel bobby pins, or vibrantly patterned couture outfits, their pieces are delicious fodder for the imagination.

It’s time for the Seattle Art Fair, taking place July 23–26 at the Lumen Field Event Center. I probably don’t have to explain art fairs to anyone, but art fairs are the glitzy cousin of trade fairs, usually housed in fluorescent-flooded convention centers, where galleries gather under one roof to show off their hottest, most buyable work.

The Naked and Infamous: Denny Blaine Park, Seattle’s favorite hangout for nude gays, will stay open and partially naked, a judge ruled yesterday. The unsightly anti-masturbation fence will stay up, and the city will have to staff the beach with masturbation spotters, place signs outlining good and bad behavior, and establish buffer zones that block neighbors’ views of the naked. Our contributor Guy Oron has the story. Think you’re having a bad day at work? Imagine being Rep.

ARIES (March 21-April 19): In honor of the intensive homecoming phase of your astrological cycle, I have homework for you. 1. Make a prediction about how old you will be when you know precisely who you are. 2. Forecast the day when you will look in the mirror and recognize your face as an intricate portrait of every experience you have ever loved. 3. Imagine the dawn when the boundary between your own longing and life’s longing will dissolve, revealing they’ve always been the same current. 4.

King County Superior Court Judge Samuel Chung has ordered Denny Blaine Park to remain open and naked (on the lower half  of the park), with conditions. The anti-masturbation fence—the City’s response to Chung’s court-ordered abatement plan to curb masturbation and “lewd” conduct—will remain stoically in place.