Celebrating the fun of freedom at Fremont Solstice Parade

How It's Done looks at secrets, curiosities and mysteries behind Northwest icons and traditions.

In honor of the longest day of the year, Seattle's Fremont neighborhood lives up to its self-anointed claim as the center of the universe by hosting the Fremont Solstice Parade, with giant puppets, exotic dancers and merry mayhem. Hard to believe, but Saturday marks the 20th parade. We have to thank for that founders Peter Toms and Barbara Luecke, the artists who started it all back in 1989. Here's how and why they do it:

Q: How does it feel to be the inventors of an event that's now a Seattle icon, a summer tradition?

P.T.: We had good reason to suspect the parade would be successful because we had already experienced how rewarding this kind of event can be for both participants and spectators.

B.L.: Years ago, we were both active in a carnival parade in Santa Barbara. We transplanted the seeds here because we especially missed the art-lab experience of the public workshops.

Q: Why bring it here?

P.T.: Because it needed doing. Outside of paid commercial events like football games, there was no reason to get lots of people together outside. We wanted a celebration of joyful freedom with a capital F. We live such controlled lives. It's great that, for a few hours, people can experience real, unmitigated free expression.

Q: The parade is open to anybody and you can sign up for a pre-parade workshop and learn how to make costumes, floats, puppets, whatever. How are some of those really big puppets made?

B.L.: Different techniques. Most of them are papier-mâché, but some are using lightweight foam now. People also use silk batik on a frame, which billows nicely.

Q: What's the infrastructure made of?

B.L.: PVC pipe, bamboo, cardboard, backpack frames. You have to be aware of the weight and the center of gravity.

Q: Peter, your medium is a pair of stilts.

P.T.: I learned how to walk on stilts about the second or third parade and now use stilts that are 44 inches tall. I encourage stilt walking because it's a physical skill nearly anyone can master, and you get the best views. I also have the best job — the ringmaster. I lead the parade until we get to the Center of the Universe (by the Lenin statue, Fremont Avenue and 35th Avenue Northwest).

Q: What are your duties there?

P.T.: I'm one of the MCs and give a running commentary on what I'm seeing.

Q: So you're what broadcasters call the color guy.

P.T.: More like the off-color guy. I'm familiar with a lot of the floats but there's always something that surprises me. You never know what's going to show up on parade morning.

Q: Like what?

P.T.: Last year there was the King Kong float from Los Angeles. They had Fay Wray, the airplanes, all of it. And it's good to welcome back the long-standing community groups that take part — belly dancers, samba bands, steel drums.

Q: And the bikers. I promise not to dwell on the topic but I have to ask about the naked bicycle riders.

P.T.: I have mixed feelings about all of that because we're known across the country as that naked parade and it's so much more than that. At the same time, the bikers have grown into a most unusual art form. It started out with some boys and a few women being naughty by taking off their drawers, but now their bodies are the canvas. Last year, there were honeybee bikers and six people formed an American flag. It's become a great part of the free expression that we're cultivating.

Q: Even with the bikers, the parade feels family friendly.

B.L.: There's a core group of people that comes back year after year and their children have grown up with the parade. My kids have. My son, who's now in college, has been in all the parades. For them, it's just normal for people to think up large, wild ideas and pull them off in front of a happy crowd.

Q: It must take a lot of organizing and work.

B.L.: Just getting the volunteers together in the workshops takes a lot of people, then we have to raise money to pay for things like Porta Potties, fencing, insurance, permits. Just because it's wacky doesn't mean it's free.

Q: Hence the iconic Green Hat that's passed along the route?

P T.: The Green Hat is a direct link that allows people to donate and keep the Solstice Parade rolling.

Q: This is what you'd call your interactive parade.

P.T.: By design. We want to blur the line between audience and performer. In most parades, people go by on their floats and wave. We're encouraging people to have a shtick that gets them into the crowd. It's supposed to be a two-way conversation, and if we do that, we've done our job.