Sadly, there are some circumstances where XAML is virtually inescapable (e.g. constructing templates; you can use the deprecated FrameworkElementFactory, but it's pretty ugly).

So are you building your application by just creating the object model in code or using the designer and never looking at the XAML?

All code, i even wrote a helper framework to make coded wpf more powerful:

http://bling.codeplex.com

You can write things like button.Left = label.Right + 20 and it will synthesize the data binding code automatically.