If you haven’t been to the Fremont Solstice Parade, you might not realize, given the turn the major coverage has taken in recent years, that it includes much more than naked, body-painted bicycle riders. For example: In the photo above, that’s The Center School‘s dragon in Saturday’s parade. (The Center School is a high school based at Seattle Center, “with a focus on the arts and community engagement” per its website, part of the Seattle Public Schools system.) It was a creation of West Seattleite Andy Bell‘s “Global Arts and Cultural Expressions” class at The Center School – here’s Andy and son Adam Bell in the parade:

The 25-foot dragon was accompanied by artists from the school expressing a variety of genres; they got other youth involved along the parade route, decorating the dragon as it went:

Thanks to Paul Dieter, a West Seattleite and Center School parent, for sharing the photos (and for his WSB Forums note that the parade isn’t just about the two-wheel, no-clothes crowd – although note there WAS well-rounded coverage on one of our fellow independent neighborhood-news sites, FremontUniverse.com, which is affiliated with nearby Ballard’s #1 online news source, MyBallard.com). We’re less than a month away now, by the way, from West Seattle’s own summertime parade, the American Legion Grand Parade (that’s its official name; though you may know it as the “Hi-Yu Parade,” it’s presented by Legion Post 160, not by the Hi-Yu Festival). It’s coming up on Saturday, July 18th.