Most Influential People

Movers & Shakers

Movers & Shakers

Profiling the people who shaped Seattle

Back in April 1968, Seattle magazine published a feature similar to our Most Influential issue, focusing on those who “truly call the shots.”

Most Influential, Sports: Kalen Deboer

Most Influential, Sports: Kalen Deboer

Former University of Washington football coach

He started out small, leading Sioux Falls to three NAIA championships in his five years as head coach. He then worked his way up the NCAA food chain with stops at Southern Illinois and Western Michigan…

Photo by Scott Eklund / Redbox Pictures

Most Influential, Arts: Shin Yu Pai

Most Influential, Arts: Shin Yu Pai

Poet, author, podcaster

Pai is an award-winning author, podcaster, and the city of Seattle’s 2023-24 Civic Poet. She has spent more than two decades in the literary field, penning 13 books…

Photo by Sung Park

Most Influential, Arts: Jose Iñiguez

Most Influential, Arts: Jose Iñiguez

Educator, musician

Jose Iñiguez discovered the art of opera through a PBS special. As a teenager, he came across a program featuring a tenor singing an aria while watching TV with his dad…

Photo by Ashley Genevieve

Most Influential, Education: Quinton Morris

Most Influential, Education: Quinton Morris

Artist, educator

I’m committed to educating and helping students transform their lives through Key to Change. My goal is to expand the program to reach more students…

Photo by Sung Park

Most Influential, Hospitality: J. Kenji López-Alt

Most Influential, Hospitality: J. Kenji López-Alt

Chef, author

López-Alt is a two-time James Beard Award-winner, with all three of his books making it onto The New York Times bestseller list. His latest book, The Wok, currently in bookstores, won him his second James Beard Award this year.

Photo by J. Kenji López-Alt

Most Influential, Arts: Christina Scheppelmann

Most Influential, Arts: Christina Scheppelmann

General director, Seattle Opera

On November 22, 1981, a teenage Christina Scheppelmann saw Don Carlo in Hamburg, Germany. The five-act opera, which Scheppelmann called an “incredibly monumental, relevant piece of music,” displayed the life and conflicts of a fictional 16th-century European prince. From then on, she was in love. “(Opera) is incredibly emotional. It’s exciting,” she says. “If you…

Most Influential, Business: Marques Warren

Most Influential, Business: Marques Warren

Entrepreneur

The solution-minded Warren founded Cougar Mountain Financial, a lender specializing in loans to women and minority-owned businesses at airports. So far, he has financed restaurants at a food court at Los Angeles International Airport, and several retailers at San Francisco International Airport…

Photo by Danielle Barnum

Most Influential, Education: Sheila Edwards Lange

Most Influential, Education: Sheila Edwards Lange

Educator

When Dr. Sheila Edwards Lange was appointed chancellor of the University of Washington Tacoma in the fall of 2021, she became the highest-ranking Black administrator in the UW system.

Photo by Ryan Moriarty/UW Tacoma

Most Influential, Sports, Equity, Activism: Sue Bird, Megan Rapinoe

Most Influential, Sports, Equity, Activism: Sue Bird, Megan Rapinoe

Athletes, activists

Though Megan Rapinoe and Sue Bird both retired last year, chances are you’ll hear from them more often than ever…

Photo by Beau Grealy / Trunk Archive

Most Influential, Equity: Cynthia Brothers

Most Influential, Equity: Cynthia Brothers

Preservationist, activist

“I had been back in Seattle for a while,” says Brothers, who grew up in Seattle and went to graduate school at New York University. “There were a lot of changes happening fast. The tech boom, people getting pushed out, gentrification. It was something I didn’t like witnessing.”

Photo by Tom Butcher

Most Influential, Hospitality: Keiji Tsukasaki

Most Influential, Hospitality: Keiji Tsukasaki

Chef, restaurateur

Volume in music is like seasoning food. Raise the volume too high and it warps the sound. Overseason the perfect bowl of crispy, warm, golden french fries with too much salt and you might as well be choking down a full salt shaker. The right balance of rhythm and harmony is akin to the balance of salt, fat, and acid in food.

Photo by Jesse Rivera

Most Influential, Arts: Anthony White

Most Influential, Arts: Anthony White

Artist, curator

White helped in the development and creation of the Lillian Miller Foundation Fellowship for Trans* and Indigiqueer Artists — a $10,000 unrestricted cash award offered for Washington state artists of all disciplines who self-identify as trans. “There was a lack of grants focused on trans and Indigiqueer artists,” White notes. “Offering this grant welcomes in more people.”

Photo by James Harnois

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