Shopping in San Francisco
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Aquarius Records
When pop seems played out, this is the dawning of the age of Aquarius Records, featuring Armenian blues, rare 1970s recordings by SF’s Moog-powered punk rockers The Units, and new releases of blissed-out trance on – get this – cassette. Recent staff favorites include Ethiopian funkmaster Mahmoud Ahmed, groovy Brazilian garage rockers Bango and aluminum records of sci-fi synth by Finnish band Aavikko.
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826 Valencia
Given a Mission diet of burritos, margaritas and coffee, creative types seem to thrive - hence the local design boutiques, 'zine bookstores and nonprofit arts venues clustered around Valencia and Mission Sts. When a Pirate Supply Store landed at 826 Valencia, selling eye patches and McSweeney's publications to fund youth writing workshops, the Mission found its dream mission.
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Japonesque
Wabi-sabi is not something you smear on sushi but the fine appreciation for organic forms and materials you can experience first-hand at Japonesque. Owner Koichi Hara stocks antique Japanese bamboo baskets and raku ceramics alongside Ruth Rhoten’s molten silver vases and Hiromichi Iwashita’s graphite-coated, chiseled-wood panels that look like bonfire embers.
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Upper Playground
Blend into the SF scenery with locally designed Fillmore neighborhood hoodies, Barbary Coast pirate tees and knit Muni caps. Men’s gear dominates the main store, but there’s an even more impressive selection of locally designed tees in the women’s annex, and slick graffiti art in Fifty24SF Gallery next door.
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DSW
The basement clearance section is where recovering shoe hounds come once they’ve sworn that they’ve bought their last pair for the season. Diligent research has uncovered 40% to 60% off Marc Jacobs flats, Betsy Johnson wedges and an inexplicable bonanza of limited-edition Pumas.
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Westfield San Francisco Shopping Center
So much for traveling light: SF souvenirs start out packable in Chinatown with silk slippers; however, on Grant Ave between Bush and Filbert Sts, you'll discover custom zoot suits, local designer dresses and rare vinyl. Anyone tempted by locally designed earrings, handmade felt rugs and mod candelabras should beware Union St from Steiner to Van Ness Sts, as well as Hayes St between Franklin and Laguna Sts. Foot fetishists, CD hoarders and vintage clotheshounds can't resist the siren call of the Upper Haight, while used books and thrift-store scores await along Valencia and Mission Sts between 16th and 24th Sts. Mall rats may never escape the 400 stores of Westfield San Fr…
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Mission Statement
Finally: locally designed, fashion-forward clothing and accessories that keep real people, real bodies and real budgets in mind. Sofie Ølgaard’s drop-waisted silk sheaths are drop-dead gorgeous, Vanessa Gade’s circle-chain necklaces bring a touch of infinity to your neckline, and Estrella Tadao’s reconstructed ’70s men’s jackets revive radical-chic Maoist placket pockets. The counter staff at this collective are designers, so if that yellow bamboo-fiber wrap cardigan doesn’t fit just so, they’ll get one made to order for you on the spot.
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H&M
What IKEA is to home furnishing, H&M is to fashion: suspiciously affordable, perpetually crowded, not really made for the long haul and perfect for parties. With limited-edition runs and special collections by designers like splashy British colorist Matthew Williamson (and lesser ones like, oof, Madonna) you won’t have to worry that your closet looks exactly like everyone else’s – unless you bought it at IKEA. There are several outlets in town, but the one on Powell St is the biggest, with a vast men’s section.
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Ambiance
The splashy prints reel you in, and the sales pitch works every time: ‘Oh. My. God. That looks so key-oot on you!’ Expect to emerge clutching some little number requiring you to hit the town: swingy skirts for Lindy-hopping in Golden Gate Park, or DNA-pattern jackets for biotech lectures. The shoe-and-sale store next door encourages you to keep the retail rush going, while the sister store at 1458 Haight St features teen-appropriate prom dresses, and 1858 Union St in the Marina offers cocktail attire.
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Velvet da Vinci
You can actually see the ideas behind these handcrafted gems: Lynn Christiansen puts her food obsessions into a purse that looks like whipped cream, and Enric Majoral’s Mediterranean meditations yield rings that appear to be made of sand. Shows here reveal brilliance behind the baubles; during the Ethical Metalsmiths’ ‘Radical Jewelry Makeover, ’ the public was invited to bring broken trinkets to be recycled into new jewelry, with sales supporting a campaign for responsible sourcing practices.
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Little Otsu
Finally, organizational tools for the artistically inclined: a ‘Film Diary’ so you can keep track of your SF Film Festival favorites, Keri Smith’s free-form ‘Daily Non-Planner’ so you can make dates and capture ideas when so moved, and a Simon Evans airplane bookmark that ominously declares its destination as ‘TERMINAL EXCESSIVE SENSIBILITIES.’ Stationery with jellyfish printed in vegetable inks on 100% post-consumer recycled paper makes an eco-smart gift, and everyone deserves a wombat button.
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Loyal Army Clothing
Food with high self-esteem is a recurring theme on this San Francisco designer’s cartoon-cute tees, totes and baby clothes: California rolls brag to nigiri sushi, ‘That’s how we roll!, ’ smiling custard declares ‘Girls just wanna have flan!’ and a grumpy bran muffin surrounded by uber-adorable pink cupcakes protests, ‘Muffins are cute on the inside.’ But the most popular character is the San Francisco fogbank: most of the clouds are silver and smiling, but there’s always one that has fangs.
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Loehmann’s
The most revealing Downtown fashion choice isn’t what shoes you wear, but which floor you choose in this discount designer superstore. North Beach artists drift to the middle floor for almost-free Free People smocks; Pacific Heights charity fundraisers hit the top floor for discounted Prada shirtdresses; and gift shoppers converge around 40%-off red-tagged Kate Spade clutches in main-floor accessories. Pace yourself: women’s shoes and an impressive men’s section are across the street.
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MAC
MAC ‘Modern Appealing Clothing’ is what they promise, and what they deliver with structured looks from Belgian minimalist Dries Van Noten, pop-art patterns from Van Beirendonck and silk dresses with midnight-blue forest silhouettes by Tsumori Chisato. The staff are on your side, rooting for you to rock these designs, steering you away from looks that don’t quite click and enjoying the contact retail high when you find something from the 40%-to-75%-off sales rack.
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Mollusk
The high-impact store sign by renowned artist Tauba Auerbach is the first hint that this is the source of West Coast surfer cool. Visits by celebrity shapers (surfboard makers) yield limited-edition boards that you won’t find anywhere else, and the signature Mollusk T-shirts and hoodies by local artists buy you nods of surfer recognition. Surf books and sculpture installations by the likes of the Society of Driftwood Enthusiasts give nonsurfers vicarious surf-subculture thrills.
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Le Sanctuaire
Mad scientists, thrill seekers and professional chefs are buzzed in speakeasy-style to this culinary curiosity shop selling anchovy juice, spherifiers to turn fruit into caviar, salt for curing meats, and of course that hallmark of molecular gastronomy: foaming agents. Check the website for classes on making smoked watermelon with vacuum sealers and using liquid nitrogen to make powdered lard – too bad suspending disbelief using gellants isn’t on the schedule.
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Super7
After tiresome T-shirt trends of self-promotion (‘Porn Star’) and retro-irony (‘Virginia is for Lovers’), it’s a shock to find piles of limited-edition T-shirts this original. ‘Superterrific Animal Friendlies’ announces one Super7 T-shirt with an unlikely superhero team of cuddly owls, bats and monkeys; ‘Martial Art Garfunkel’ proclaims another, with the ‘Mrs Robinson’ crooner striking a karate pose. Godzilla fans cannot miss the selection of rare action figures here.
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101 Music
You’ll have to bend over those bins to let DJs and hardcore collectors pass (and, hey, wasn’t that Carlos Santana?!), but among the $5 to $10 discs are obscure releases (Songs for Greek Lovers) and original recordings by Oscar Peterson, Janis Joplin and, oh yes, Pat Benatar. At the sister shop at 513 Green St, don’t bonk your head on the vintage Les Pauls, and check out the sweet turntables that must’ve cost some kid a year’s worth of burger-flipping c 1978.
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Polanco
Contemporary folk art by Mexican and Chicano artists mix traditional techniques and new ideas at Polanco, from Artemio Rodriguez’s woodcuts of Day of the Dead skeletons sporting Mohawks to a traditional ex voto painting on tin showing before and after portraits of a transgendered friend by Fernando Guevara. Don’t miss the Oaxacan devil masks embedded with actual goat’s horns and teeth, or the Frida Kahlo–esque earrings of silver hands cupping tiny hearts.
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Gump's
About 150 years before Pier One reduced Asian import chic to wicker papasan chairs, Gump's was quietly outfitting Pacific Heights meditation rooms and Nob Hill Japanese gardens with authentic decor touches. Since 1861, San Franciscan Solomon Gump's posh import and export gift emporium has been the purveyor of a range of high-end-to-overpriced, tasteful-to-bland antiques, decorative arts and Asian home furnishings, all lovingly presented in lavish window displays.
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Jeremy’s
No South Park excursion would be complete without swapping stories about your all-time-best bargains from Jeremy’s. Runway modelling, window displays and department store customer returns translate to jaw-dropping bargains on major designers for men and women. Men’s stuff gets picked over faster, but you could score a skinny Jil Sander suit at half off if you work fast. Try before you buy – returns are possible for store credit, but only within seven days.
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Crossroads
Pssst, fashionistas: you know those designers you see lining Fillmore St? Many of their creations can be found used at Crossroads for a fraction of retail, thanks to Pacific Heights clotheshorses who tire of clothes fast and can’t be bothered to hang onto receipts. That’s why this Crossroads store is better than the other ones in the city (including Market and Haight Sts). For even better deals, trade in your own old stuff and browse the half-price rack.
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Scrap (Scroungers’ Center for Re-Usable Art Parts)
Renew, recycle and rediscover your creativity with post-industrial salvage arts and crafts from SCRAP – you’d be shocked what perfectly good raw materials San Francisco throws out. Take a workshop at SCRAP for inspiration, and make your very own Tupperware lamp, necklace from Barbie parts or Joseph Cornell–inspired diorama. Classes are held in the city; the entrance to SCRAP is at the confluence of Hwy 101 and Hwy 280, south of SoMa.
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Neiman-Marcus
Hoity-toity and proud of it, Neiman-Marcus delivers old-school wow factor with soft lighting filtered through an oval rotunda and shamelessly obsequious service. There's a reason it's called Needless Markup - unless you're prepared to surrender that trust fund, stay a good 20 ft away from the personal shopper eager to help you into that emerald green, ruched raw-silk Prada number. Check the website for designer trunk shows and fun runway events.
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Eco Citizen
Idealism meets street chic in this boutique of ecofriendly, fair-traded fabulousness, from ultraglam gold hemp jeans to Vivienne Westwood T-strap heels made of nontoxic PVC (recyclable onsite). Prices are reasonable and sales a steal – $50 could get you a fair-trade cashmere dress or SF-made Turk+Taylor organic cotton jacket. The faucet charm necklace made from reclaimed silver is truly lucky – its purchase helps support clean water initiatives.
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