A brand-new holiday tradition has come to Seattle. The Seattle Christmas Market is modeled after the European Christmas markets and brings a fun and festive feel to the Seattle Center. I visited the Christmas Market earlier today and here’s what I thought:
The tickets to get into the market are $20 for adults and you need to buy your ticket for a specific time slot. I picked the earliest time slot – 11:30 am – because I thought there would be a good chance of it being not too crowded. I really feel like a Christmas market is best explored at nighttime, with all the lights and music, but I was worried that there would be a lot of people in the evenings. I also wasn’t sure that my photos would come out as good at night.
You do have to go through security to enter the market and there was a line to get in but it went fairly quick. Once you are in the market there are so many things to see. There was a cute archway called Lovers’ Lane, that had mistletoe hung up. There is a walk-through Christmas tree and the Nordstrom Merry Go Round. There are also lots of decorations and many places to take a cute photo.
There were over 50 vendors selling beautiful handcrafted gifts. I thought some of them were a little overpriced, but you have to consider the work that goes into making these handcrafted items. There were also plenty of food vendors selling all kinds of delicious treats. There was wood-fired pizza, crepes, churros, these yummy-looking sandwiches that were just melted cheese over bread, pretzels, bratwurst, chocolate, and many more. You could drink coffee, hot chocolate, or Glühwein, to name a few drinks. The only thing was that, again, everything was very overpriced. I really wanted to get one of the cheese sandwiches but I didn’t want to spend $20 on just that.
The actual market is located on the South Fountain Lawn and Fischer Pavillion at the Seattle Center. It’s not very large and I was able to walk around and see all the sights in less than an hour. I guess if you get food or drink and want to do a lot of shopping, you will spend more time there, but I don’t think the event was worth the $20 ticket to get in.
I’m so happy you went and gave it a go! After being at the free christmas markets for the past 3 weeks in europe … and Gluhwein (literally) being 4€ each and all food was a max of 12€… it’s hard for me to read this. It makes me sad knowing many members of the community can’t afford the luxury of a christmas market when it’s supposed to be family friendly. This is just very Seattle, and kind of disappointing.
Thanks for doing the work for us! I still might check it out next year but it sounds like I don’t need to. Haha.
Alli B | http://www.onthetripside.com
It was cute and I can see the vibe they were going for, but it was super small and way too overpriced!