Is Portland the new "it" city?

Much of the recent national attention on Portland, Oregon has come from the IFC show Portlandia, by Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein. My city has appeared a couple other places in national conversation too, and I’m wondering if people living outside Oregon have an impression of Portland getting more attention than it has in the past, and maybe developing a reputation for being a hub of national culture, like Seattle was as the home of grunge in the nineties. 

A search on the LA Time website reveals two and a half pages of articles mentioning Portland from this year alone, including this article from the end of February about Voodoo Doughnuts, the much-hyped and not-very-good doughnut shop newspapers in other cities love to write about. A fashion designer from Portland won Project Runway at the end of last year; two of our restaurants were featured in a post on Details.com this month. And while I know we don't have sole claim to the term "hipster," it's very often applied to Portland's population... and Yelp has commandeered the term. It is Portland's irresistible influence? Maybe.

Besides culture, we're also often cited for good policy and livability. Portland’s often been praised for its bicycle-friendliness, high quality public transportation (which I use every day, thanks Trimet!), and sustainability (sometimes called "greenness").  We also have Powell’s Books, the largest independent bookstore in the world, a thriving food cart scene, great coffee and beer… but you know these things. The question is, are we getting any cooler, or are we still just a bunch of unemployed hippies?

Eleanor Brown