Seattle is booming -- but we still hold these things sacred

What best represents the soul of Seattle? Here's what readers said...

Seattle Center: Writes one reader: "I think the Seattle Center is quintessentially Seattle. From the almost weekly festivals that highlight the many different nationalities and cultures Seattle represents, to Bumbershoot, to the International Fountain, to Folk Life, to the scientific and technological side of Seattle that is featured in the Pacific Science Center, to the local musical icons we celebrate at the MoPop. We show our Seattle pride there, our pride in our similarities and our differences. Seattlites begin each year there, jointly looking toward our beautiful Space Needle with fireworks to celebrate. We gather there for vigils, like the one held for Carrie Fisher in December. Our marches of celebration and of protest almost always end there, as a meeting point for people who want to connect. We host plays and ballet and musical concerts there. We see our history there in the Armory and the Monorail. We show our out of town relatives, our foreign exchange students, our friends who live elsewhere, the joys of all that represents Seattle by introducing them to the Seattle Center. We would be bereft without such a lovely and historic place to meet and visit. I can't imagine Seattle without the Seattle Center." — **Seattle Center:** Writes one reader: "I think the Seattle Center is quintessentially Seattle. From the almost weekly festivals that highlight the many different nationalities and cultures Seattle represents, to Bumbershoot, to the International Fountain, to Folk Life, to the scientific and technological side of Seattle that is featured in the Pacific Science Center, to the local musical icons we celebrate at the MoPop. We show our Seattle pride there, our pride in our similarities and our differences. Seattlites begin each year there, jointly looking toward our beautiful Space Needle with fireworks to celebrate. We gather there for vigils, like the one held for Carrie Fisher in December. Our marches of celebration and of protest almost always end there, as a meeting point for people who want to connect. We host plays and ballet and musical concerts there. We see our history there in the Armory and the Monorail. We show our out of town relatives, our foreign exchange students, our friends who live elsewhere, the joys of all that represents Seattle by introducing them to the Seattle Center. We would be bereft without such a lovely and historic place to meet and visit. I can't imagine Seattle without the Seattle Center."
JORDAN STEAD/SEATTLEPI.COM

There are times when, as someone who grew up in Seattle, you might not recognize the city at all.

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Some locations this is more exaggerated than others; South Lake Union looms shiny and unrecognizable over the SLU neighborhood just a few years (or seemingly days), and the Central District seems to be getting plunged headfirst into gentrification.

But the truth is Seattle is a city on the rise, even if that boom is slowing some what. In tech jobs alone, the city has added some 33,000 positions in 2016 and 2017 alone. More than 100,000 people have relocated here since 2009.

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But that doesn't mean there aren't things that true Seattleites hold dear. In fact, it often means that they hold them tighter.

We polled readers and staff about what sorts of things they hold sacred in Seattle. Click through the slideshow to see what they said (and let us know in the comment if there's something special you'd like to add to the list).

From the our natural beauties (the mountains, the trees, the "smell of water") to our man-made stops (First Settler's monument or the Seahawks), there's plenty of truly Seattle things that made the list.