Shopping & Services >>

• Readers' Poll Winners
  Best Tech Store Apple Best Massage Kabuki Springs & Spa Best Manicures/Pedicures Silk Best Hair Salon Barber Lounge Best Women’s Clothing Ambiance Best Shoe Store Shoe Biz Best Furniture Store Room and Board Best Thrift Store Thrift Town Best Green-Conscious Retailer Rainbow Grocery ... More >>
• Best Car Repair
  Luscious Garage
  While the average car repair joint is a greasy, fume-filled hole-in-the-wall, Luscious Garage just about lives up to its name. The woman-owned biz specializes in hybrids, and its digs, located in a historic brick warehouse in SOMA, are ecologically savvy. The garage runs on solar power, it hosts... More >>
• Best New Gift Boutique
  Bell Jar
  If you're anything like us, your per-friend gift budget is a little squishy. We usually start with a well-intentioned $30 limit, which stretches toward $60 by the time we're through. Luckily, this turns out to be the perfect range for shopping at Bell Jar, the gift shop opened last year by... More >>
• Best Florist (1 Comment)
  Cherries
  Cherries looks like a rustic old potting shed overflowing with sunlight, brightly colored blossoms, and the irresistible fragrance of a warm, damp mountain meadow. Weathered cabinets, plank tables, and an old bathtub display watering cans, birdcages, earthenware pots, and enameled vases; there... More >>
• Best Place to Buy a Plant
  San Francisco Flower Mart
  Men don't buy flowers, until they're forced to. Men buy plants, the taller the better; big, leafy beasts, enough to fill up a room and hide electrical wires. Despite its fragrant name, there's no better place for plant shopping than the S.F. Flower Mart, an easy-to-miss complex where more than... More >>
• Best Used Bookstore
  Red Hill Books
  After an expansion in 2007 that doubled its (tiny) size, Red Hill Books looks poised to hold down the corner of Cortland and Bennington forever. At least, Bernal Heights residents hope so. The bookstore's smart mix of new and used fiction, children's lit, best-sellers, how-to books, arcane... More >>
• Best Punk Record Store
  Thrillhouse Records
  Thrillhouse Records is the city's little record shop that could. In an era where the only news you hear about bricks-'n'-mortar music retailers is bad, Thrillhouse continues chugging along without a cent to pay its employees. The Outer Mission nonprofit is run by a passionate pool of volunteers,... More >>
• Best Place to Recycle Old Wardrobe Items
  Miranda Caroligne
  Believe it or not, there might be a place for your '80s shoulder pads besides the landfill. This diminutive shop, which hails from the genius of designer Miranda C. Burns, has been at the vanguard of San Francisco's indie and DIY design movement since 2005. Burns and company specialize in making... More >>
• Best Jewelry Line of the Future
  Litter
  In trying to describe Mackenzie Burdick and Rachael Mann's jewelry line, the words "bondage" and "flapper" come to mind. The combination sounds campy, but it translates into some of the most innovative bling we've seen in ages. In fact, the sisters, working out of their Cow Hollow studio, appear... More >>
• Best T-Shirts with Talking Food (1 Comment)
  Loyal Army
  Where can you find smiling clouds, sad dinosaurs, and pancakes that shout, "I'm a hot mess"? Designed and run locally, Loyal Army in the Haight is filled with brightly colored purses, shirts, and accessories. A canvas bag, alternately dotted with vegetables and fast food, sells for $19.50. A... More >>
• Best Place to Transform Into a Pinup
  Dollhouse Bettie
  From babydolls to high-waist panties, Dollhouse Bettie is stocked with the kind of persona-altering vintage lingerie that invokes the spirit of busty pinup babes like Bettie Page. Whether you're in the mood for naughty or nice, this Upper Haight boutique's cinchers, garters, corsets, and other... More >>
• Best Massage
  Nell Waters Curative Massage
  Let's face it: Most massages are great. No matter how inexperienced the massage therapist, most of us love having our heads lodged in a face cradle while getting our limbs kneaded, manipulated, and plied into a big pile of blissful mush. But even when you're blessed with someone who knows a... More >>
• Best Place to Detox
  Avra Organic Spa
  Becoming mindful about your finances doesn't have to mean giving up pampering. It just means trading in your regular ol' day spa — debutantes, amenity-packed locker rooms, pretentious 'tudes, and all — for a place like Avra Organic Spa, the perfect retreat for frazzled nerves and conscientious... More >>
• Best Decadent Mani/Pedi
  Cocoon Urban Day Spa
  When it comes to the typical nail spa, you know the drill: A technician who doesn’t want to be there, much less make conversation, gives your hands or feet a cursory stroke before rushing into the treatment (likely smudging your nails in the process) and hurrying you to a drying station before... More >>
• Best Way to Make Yourself Look Younger
  Facial Rejuvenation Acupuncture at Stillpoint Wellness Center
  Aging gracefully is a virtue, and some of us know that you can stay beautiful throughout your years without going for the tautly stretched look or overloading on Botox. Bina Jangda of Stillpoint Wellness Center is one of the only acupuncturists in the city to offer facial rejuvenation... More >>
• Best Psychic Alternative
  Nicki Bonfilio
  If you're wary of New Age charlatans or find the I Ching and Tarot too esoteric to decipher, pop into intuitive counselor Nicki Bonfilio's Mission District office. Aside from winning you over with her plainspoken integrity, she will make the amorphous world of auras and energy that much more... More >>
• Best Barbershop (1 Comment)
  Joe's Barbershop
  It should surprise no one that gay men commonly harbor barbershop fantasies. If you're like a lot of guys who languished through closeted childhoods in Middle America, then you spent every third or fourth Saturday waiting with your Dad and brothers and a roomful of other men for Tom or Bob or... More >>
• Best Optometrist
  Kimberry La
  People don't fear optometrists as they do dentists or surgeons. But they ought to. An eye doctor may label your condition with words like "astigmatic" with no explanation, or worse, send you home with $450 glasses your insurance won't cover and that flatter your face only in the lighting of the... More >>
• Best Dentist
  Kenneth Wong
  Why'd the expert dentist's girlfriend leave him? He was in and out before she felt a thing. Judging from the family photos hanging on the walls of Kenneth Wong's Polk Street office, this exquisite dentist hasn't had to pay such penance for his talent. But his good-humored, sympathetic chairside... More >>
• Best Party Bus
  Teacher with the Bus
  You know party buses: those lumbering tour tanks that bellow toxins into the air and (ob)noxious drunkards into the clubs. One German-born windsurfing champion and schoolteacher has injected the bus party culture with a needed bit of sophistication. Jens-Peter Jungclaussen rents out two sleek... More >>
• Best Place to Take Care of Spring Cleaning
  GreenCitizen
  Each year, close to 400 million units of obsolete electronics get scrapped, according to the local do-gooders at GreenCitizen. That means in the years to come, billions of units will be sitting on garbage heaps, waiting to be recycled and contaminating our water, land, and air in the process.... More >>
• Best Alternative to the Plastic Grocery Sack
  RainaBags
  We don't need to lecture our eco-conscious readers on the importance of quitting your grocery sack habit. The city has already banned plastic ones, and paper ones are hardly any better for the Earth. Yet for those who'd like to make an aesthetic statement as well as a green one, try a RainaBag,... More >>
• Best Place to Buy Luggage
  Hideo Wakamatsu
  Who says utilitarian luggage and aesthetically pleasing design are mutually exclusive? Certainly not designer Hideo Wakamatsu, whose San Francisco boutique is a popular mainstay for locals and tourists alike. That's because his experimental flair, influenced by Japanese and French couture, means... More >>
• Best Indie Paper Emporium
  Little Otsu
  Otsu is an antiquated Japanese word that would give fits to the best U.N. translator; depending on the context, it can mean strange, quaint, stylish, chic, spicy, witty, tasty, or romantic. Somehow, all these adjectives apply to the small Mission storefront that combines an art gallery,... More >>
• Best Gifts for Urbanites Who Miss Nature
  Juniper Ridge
  Some "green" companies squirt essential oils into a bar of Dove and call it a day (and an $8.99 bar of soap). Not Juniper Ridge. Check out how the company started: Founder Hall Newbegin went foraging in Big Sur, picking up this leaf and that needle, then incorporating them into his soaps. He... More >>
• Best Wedding Invitations
  Hello Lucky
  Weddings are supposed to be fancy, serious occasions, and the invitations you use to announce your wedding should be equally mature: ornate creations of lace and silk and gaudiness — right? Okay, maybe not. Rest assured, nontraditional brides-to-be: Hello Lucky's invitations are nothing... More >>
• Best Party Supply Store
  Fantastico
  Even people who've never wasted a breath on party planning find themselves considering themes and streamers as they wander the cavernous Fantastico, inspecting all manner of masks, hats, banners, piñatas, disco balls, candles, costumes, plastic jewels, and ribbons. It's cheap — the... More >>
• Best Toy Store
  The Ark
  From the inside, the Ark does indeed resemble a barnlike floating refuge from the stormy seas of modern life, but the only animals aboard this Presidio Heights toy emporium are the wide array of kid-sized stuffed beasts ideal for cuddling. What's really being preserved here are Slinkys,... More >>
• Best Facial
  skinSALVATION
  If you find yourself scrutinizing your pores and lamenting prolonged adolescence despite the scads of magic potions lining your medicine cabinet, look no further. Mission District aesthetician Kimberly Yap Tan is the kind of gung-ho beauty maven who will tell you there's a perfect skincare... More >>
• Best Place for Dad to Take the Kids
  Terra Mia
  It's simple, really, to be a good dad for the afternoon. First, skip teaching your child the finer points of fielding a grounder. Then just pop into Terra Mia, find an open table, pour yourself into the able hands of the staff, and complete the easiest, most satisfying art project imaginable:... More >>
• Best Acupuncture
  San Francisco Community Acupuncture
  Getting your chi in balance needn't cost you an arm and a leg. San Francisco Community Acupuncture, a healing center helmed by Rebekah Sitty and Rebecca Rizzetta, is a clinic where ailments like insomnia and chronic pain can be assuaged at $20 to $40 a pop. Sip herbal tea in the waiting room... More >>
• Best Resource for New Parents
  DayOne
  It's the dirty secret of breastfeeding: Mother's milk doesn't appear until after the big event, when Mom is at home, far from the trained experts. What to do if things aren't flowing properly? Call DayOne and book time with one of its board-certified lactation consultants. They'll observe,... More >>
• Best Step Forward in Health Care
  Healthy San Francisco
  Healthy San Francisco, the city's fledgling universal health care program, is a bold promise in the most uncertain of times. For its 37,000 members — most with incomes at or below the federal poverty level — Healthy San Francisco offers the possibility of regular treatment instead of... More >>
• Best Lingerie
  My Boudoir Lingerie
  Grandma panties, begone! My Boudoir Lingerie is a Pacific Heights boutique for your unmentionables that is as versatile as it is small. It sports an exquisite assortment of everything from frilly accoutrements to suitably trampy getups for your vixeny alter ego. Exclusive European brands like... More >>
• Best Place for Pulp Lit
  Kayo Books
  Kayo boasts unexpurgated editions (many of them first editions) of some of the lowest-brow literature this side of the men's room. The material mainly hails from annals both obscure and lurid, from the 1930s to the 1970s. Most of the items are more depraved than an H.P. Lovecraft book. Titles by... More >>