Is Seattle too fancy?

As the city transforms around us, one of the most noticeable impacts is the visibility of affluence. I remember a time when Seattle’s rich flaunted their wealth with an understated Volvo station wagon or a modest mid-century home tucked into the trees. Wealthy neighborhoods were discreet: Broadmoor lay behind walls (and even barbed wire), The Highlands invisible in the forest. Conspicuous consumption was frowned upon.

Back in the ancient 1980s, a nouveau riche Bellevue man built a massive waterfront mansion on Meydenbauer Bay. Its appearance outraged the affluent community with the flaunting of faux grandeur, which some angry residents claimed resembled the kind of over-the-top excess seen from “Arab” oil money.

I worked at Washington magazine at the time and we featured a large photograph of the home. Its owner threatened to sue us for drawing attention to his wildly visible home. But the real issue for neighbors was that it violated an unspoken rule of Seattle and the Gold Coast: enjoy your money, but don’t flaunt it.

Now we’re treated to features about Seattle’s “most expensive” homes for sale, which according to the P-I are currently in the $7 million to $11 million range.

Another sign of affluence and flash: the Seattle Times reports that the sensible Subaru—extremely popular in Seattle—is getting a run for its money from luxury car ownership.

The Subaru—and full disclosure, I’ve driven that same Forester since the year 2000—has long been the equivalent of Gor-Tex hiking shoes for the urban Seattleite. In other words, standard gear, whether walking the city or attending the opera.

But the Times says that ownership of the city’s top three luxury cars—Mercedes, Lexus and BMW—are rapidly catching up. A map lets you know what type of neighborhood you live in, “crunchy or fancy,” as the newspaper puts it. Crunch is still audible to North Seattle and and West Seattle. But elsewhere, automotively speaking, we’re a lot more like Bellevue and the Eastside.

I’m aware of this in my neighborhood in Madison Park, which is a luxury car haven despite my Forester. What I’ve noticed, especially in places where cars congregate, such as the Starbucks at Madison & McGilvra, is that luxury cars are often SUVs that resemble rolling gated communities. You can also bet that if you encounter an impatient asshole on the road, they’re likely driving a BMW.

The funny thing is, many of the luxury SUV’s I see are essentially Subarus with pricier brand labels. Gone are the Volvos, replaced by SUV oddities like the all-wheel drive Porsche Cayenne, which looks a lot like a Subaru you paid too much for.

We’re trading of “sensible shoes” for status symbols.