Shopping & Services

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• Shopping & Services
• Sports & Recreation

• Best Experts on the Great Outdoors

  Adventure 16 Outdoor and Travel Outfitters

  Hardcore hikers and backpackers typically go to two places for expedition equipment: REI or Adventure 16. REI's stuff tends to be less expensive, but Adventure 16, particularly the larger West Los Angeles location, is the place to go if you want to talk to someone who really knows a Marmot sleeping bag from a North Face. And the last thing… More >>

• Best L.A. Record Store

  Amoeba Records

  It's a music retail ghost town, yes. We don't need to be reminded. Those were our jobs, and our expense accounts, and our backstage passes, that vanished along with the neighborhood record stores. Gone are Aron's, Sea Level and Tower, ashes to ashes, funk to funky. Last year the Virgin on Sunset bit the dust. It adds up, you know?… More >>

• Best Fashion and Art Mixtape

  Ooga Booga

  Wendy Yao, local artist and den mother of L.A.'s burgeoning Chinatown scene, curates her store, Ooga Booga, with all the thought and precision of a carefully selected mixtape made for a longtime friend. Clothes and bags mingle with prints, books, zines and one-of-a-kind items. Sometimes there are actual mixtapes for sale from the likes of K Records impresario Calvin Johnson.… More >>

• Best Costco of Thrift Stores

  Lincoln Heights St. Vincent de Paul

  Everyone has their own favorite neighborhood thrift store, the name and location of which they guard with the close-lipped fervor of Allied operatives keeping state secrets from the Nazis. Each store specializes in merchandise subject to the individual whims of its proprietor. Aardvark's Odd Ark has long been the place to go for retro dresses, vintage skirts and plain, white… More >>

• L.A.'s best comic book shops: Best Overall

  Meltdown Comics and Collectables

  If you're in a hurry on a new-release Wednesday and don't have the time or desire to make the rounds to the many small suppliers that dot the city, Meltdown is your one-stop shop, the Amoeba of the L.A. comic scene. Walk in and drown in the colors that pour from each rack, the Smiths' "Girlfriend in a Coma" on… More >>

• Best Beetle Mechanic

  Wabbit Wepair

  By the time I coasted my ailing new Beetle down Abbot Kinney Boulevard to Wabbit Wepair, my dashboard was lit up with more warnings than a tilted pinball machine. Punching my accelerator to the floor gained me roughly 10 mph per half-mile, despite my having just paid $1,073.49 to a well-meaning mechanic who'd ignored my request for a new fuel… More >>

• L.A.'s Best Comic Book Shops: Fine-Art Comic Store

  Family

  It's a distinction that enthusiasts will probably quibble with — each comic freak is convinced that his genre of choice features the "finest" "art" (well, maybe not manga obsessives, who surely must acknowledge that the majority of its practitioners employ a lesser, more regimented pictorial delivery system) — but for our money, Family on Fairfax is the best place to… More >>

• Best Vet for Crazy Cat ladies

  Westside Hospital for Cats

  If cats were to design their own hospital, it would be the Westside Hospital for Cats. As the name implies, the state-of-the-art, full-service feline-health center is "cats only," so that the cats don't get stressed by the presence of lesser species, like dogs, parakeets, turtles, fish, lizards, guinea pigs, hamsters, rats, mice, snakes, ferrets and pretty much every other living… More >>

• L.A.'s Best Comic Book Shops: Comics Curators

  Secret Headquarters

  In addition to having the best comic-store name, one that captures the mysterious allure of the comics underworld and the warped brains that inhabit it, Secret Headquarters at Sunset Junction is a mighty little store that manages to fit a surprisingly deep catalog into its compact confines. It opened in 2005 with the goal of scratching many diverse itches rather… More >>

• Best Place to Buy Someone Else's Memories

  Melrose Trading Post (stall #67C)

  Holy cheese, the world is an amazing and horrifying place, and the proof lies in big cardboard boxes in Mark Kologi's photo stall at the labyrinthine Melrose Trading Post. Here are countless examples of the Freak Parade that is the human race. Each box is filled with thousands of little photographic moments, snapshots that depict not only a person or… More >>

• Best Independent Car Mechanic

  Donny Wong, Far East Auto Service

  I was fighting a weight machine in the Hollywood Bally's when my cell phone vibrated. It was a man from a big-chain tire shop, but not the guy I'd left my car with 20 minutes ago. That first guy, Joe, had been all about the tires, which made sense, since I had left my car there to replace my original… More >>

• Best Saints for Sinners

  The God Shop Gallery

  There's not much sinning to be done in Burbank. There are more than a dozen churches in the city, and while nearby North Hollywood boasts six strip clubs (even conservative Glendale has a gentleman's club), the only breasts you'll see in Burbank are dipped in batter and fried at the local Hooters. But don't walk into the God Shop Gallery… More >>

• Best Cutters

  L.A. Final Cut Pro Users' Group

  Every fourth Wednesday of the month is L.A. Final Cut Pro Users' Group night in Hollywood's Barns­dall Art Park, where filmmakers of every stripe congregate to explore different aspects of FCP editing software. As movie editing goes, Final Cut Pro is the Coke to Avid's Pepsi (or is it the other way around?), and whether you're an FCP novice, a professional… More >>

• Best Drinking and Dressing

  Enid & Edgar Vintage

  Dub night at the Echoplex and the DJs are hypnotic, the rappers phenomenal. I don't drink too much, and soak it up afterward with a tofu dog from the street vendor — grilled jalapeños and everything. Then I walk a few feet down Glendale Boulevard into Enid & Edgar, an ivory-walled closet full of vintage dresses made at the time of… More >>

• Best Place to Indulge Your Inner Author

  Scribble Press

  Lovingly crafting the words and sentences that may eventually give birth to a bound, beautifully designed tome is the true joy of writing. But most writers know that the real labor is finding a publisher. Well, shelf your pain. You only need to spend a morning — or an entire day, if you'd like — at Scribble Press to see… More >>

• Best Doggy Lunch Stop

  Pussy & Pooch

  Pussy & Pooch, a chic dog (and, yes, cat) boutique in downtown's Arts District, is the ultimate place to spoil your dog's appetite. The entrepreneurs behind this dog oasis created the "Pawbar," which looks like an ordinary bar, except for the holes cut out in the floor, and the squares of AstroTurf that line the place. The result is a… More >>

• Best Surfing Instructor

  Kai Sanson, Zuma Surf and Swim Training

  Kai Sanson takes you to a beach where the surf rolls in slowly. He has a key to the gate; the security guards know him. Even on a Saturday morning, there are no more than five or six surfers on the half-mile-wide beach. He walks with you down to the water, tells you how to assess the scene and advises… More >>

• Best Doggy Fashion

  Woof Dog Boutique

  Does Sparky really want to go for a walk and exercise? Or has he been dreaming of trying on a ballerina costume? Treat drama-queen dogs to a fashion adventure at Woof in Atwater Village, where their wildest costume dreams will be fulfilled. Whether it's a pirate hat, pink wig or sailor outfit, Sparky will certainly be the belle of the… More >>

• Best Men's Hat Store That Isn't Really a Men's Hat Store

  Helping Hand Thrift Store

  Fairfax Avenue's tiny Ethiopian District gets a lot of press for its cafés and the very fact of its continuing survival just south of Mid-Wilshire's ever-expanding luxury housing, museums and eateries. Easy to miss in this tattered shopping district is one quirky store — part junk shop, part treasure hunt — that offers some of the best men's hat shopping… More >>

• Best Lost Art Found

  Aardvark Letterpress

  Luis Ocon is 71 by now. He mostly just comes in and spins the machines, and tinkers around sometimes. But back in the '60s in Mexico City, he was setting slugs with the best of 'em. Then, the California-dreaming linotype operator made his way to the USA and pressed on to Hollywood, where he got a job at the Aardvark… More >>

• Best Museum Gift Shop

  Huntington Library Bookstore & More

  The happeningest place at any museum, aside from the courtyard coffee cart, is the gift shop. The one at MOCA in New York is almost as legendary as the museum itself. The shop at Armand Hammer Museum in Westwood has a stellar collection of whimsical toys and modern doodads, and I'd wager that only Amazon.com has a more extensive collection… More >>

• Best Writer's Block Party

  826LA East

  The Echo Park Time Travel Mart on Sunset Boulevard is not what it seems. A sign across the otherwise unremarkable building reads: "Whenever You Are, We're Already Then." Inside you will find dinosaur eggs incubating on shelves, sand-filled bottles of "Time," (five minutes, $5.99; one day, $9.99; one year, $17.99), tubes of "Human Emotions for Robots," "Dead Languages" in jars.… More >>

• Best Fine Art on the Cheap

  Peter Vanstone Inc.

  There's a funny little stretch of Sunset that climbs the hill just east of Silver Lake Boulevard to a place where the war between immigrant shopping strip and Echo Park hipster hangout has not, and might never be, settled. And it's here, along a dusty curb and behind an alluring store window display, that home decorators and posh Westside antiquers… More >>

• Best Doggy Ride

  Super Shmuttle

  With vans whose yellow-and-blue exteriors were inspired by the human van service, Super Shmuttle drivers often get asked how much they charge for a ride to the airport. The answer varies, depending on whether the passenger wants to stop at the vet first. After walking dogs for 18 years, owner Judy Rudin had the idea to create the unique dog-transportation… More >>

• Best Steals and Deals on Robertson: Boutique for Bratz

  Kira Plastinina

  Even before Robertson Boulevard topped Rodeo Drive as the most star-studded street in the universe, it was a steady style stop for babes with big bucks. The Ivy's $30 salads aside, celebs come to the street for stores like Intermix and Curve, whose well-edited selections of seasonally chic pieces are consistently covetable, and have been since well before the area… More >>

• Best Doggy Day Camp

  Wagville

  It's hard being a working parent when you have to leave the dog alone all by herself for the day (before she's old enough for kindergarten, of course). For those dog owners who don't want to hire a nanny, Wagville offers a daycare and boarding package comparable to summer camp. Small and large dogs are separated into 14,000 square feet… More >>

• Best Steals and Deals on Robertson: Keeping Up With the Rich Bitches

  Kitson Outlet

  The most famous store on Robertson, Kitson, obviously isn't a place for the frugal to flock — it's all high-end brands or overpriced stuff you can get much better deals on elsewhere. The Kitson Outlet down the street is another story. Shockingly, the discount space hasn't received a lot of press, but we think it has something to do with… More >>

• Best No-Frills Eyebrow Wax and Tint

  Simply the Best Nail

  Anastasia in Beverly Hills it's not. The only attempts at decorating in this beige, bleak Vietnamese-run joint in Hollywood are the pots of fake flowers — and the colorful stacked bottles of polish, whose chemical aromas greet you like a slap in the face. This bare-bones shop is surprisingly busy serving a local clientele that includes students from nearby Hollywood High,… More >>

• Best Steals and Deals on Robertson: Slacker Streetwear

  WESC - CLOSED

  The fiercest fashion for the fellas can be found at WESC (which stands for "We Are the Superlative Conspiracy" ... whatever that means). Jason Lee is the mascot or something, but don't expect white-trashy Earl looks here. Sophisticated slacker streetwear describes these duds, and while they ain't cheap, they aren't outrageous either. Tees in the $20-$30 range, pants $80-$90, and… More >>

• Best Steals and Deals on Robertson: Makeup Samples

  M.A.C Cosmetics

  For those of us more concerned with looking like a star than looking at one, there's M.A.C Cosmetics. (We actually did spend all our allowance on M.A.C lipsticks when we were teens!) These days the tempestuously hued lipsticks go for 14 bucks a pop, but you can get one for free at the Robertson flagship if you save the packaging… More >>

• Best Steals and Deals on Robertson: Tee-Totaler

  American Apparel

  American Apparel's selection is as expansive as its list of locations, but even for a store that is all but ubiquitous, opening a Robertson post was a risk (the rent must be ridiculous). Or was it? With Robertson's more recognizable regulars seen almost daily on the gossip blogs and TV, the area now attracts more tourists than ever, and the… More >>

• Best Bodywork: Budget Thai Massage

  Chiang Mai

  In a town oozing with Rolfers, shiatsu masters, neuromuscular therapists and Thai massage hotties, you'd think that finding the best, or at least a best bodyworker would be a snap. You'd think. There are variables to consider: schooling, skill, talent, energy, presence, quality of touch; plus extras: an intuitive sense of where tension is hiding or psychic reads on emotional issues tangled… More >>

• Best Bodywork: House Calls

  Kelly Ronan Garey

  Still in the realms of the affordable, Kelly Ronan Garey makes house calls. Trained in a slew of healing modalities, including polarity therapy and reflexology, Garey's got that wide-eyed, innocent Midwest thing going, even though he's from the Bay area. His deep tissue is rock solid, but it's his cranial-sacral skills that make me ooh and ahh, awash in the… More >>

• Best Invisible Magic Shop

  Magic Apple

  Capital of the illusion (i.e., film and TV) industry, home to the Magic Castle and more magicians than you can shake a wand at while wearing a tuxedo, Los Angeles is the best city in the world to buy the everyday staples of magic. So it makes sense that there are many magic stores in Southern California, but no better… More >>

• Best Bodywork: Pain Spotter

  Amy Marquet

  When the odd demon holes up in my shoulder, and my body goes into full-fledged revolt, I turn to Amy Marquet's tenacious hands and aromatherapy arsenal. The tiny spitfire with a wild Aquarian imagination and 16 years of experience under her (neatly trimmed) fingernails has a talent for finding those deeply hidden sore spots, and going after them with a… More >>

• Best Bodywork: Best Magic Touch

  Aradhana Silvermoon

  When I'm in need of nurturing and a dose of sparkle, I call upon Aradhana Silvermoon. A Topanga girl with the relaxed disposition and vegan sandals to prove it, Silvermoon comes armed with her hemp satchel full of lotions and potions and essential oils — fairy dust too. Equal parts warrior, medicine woman and earth mother, Silvermoon — who runs… More >>

• Best Bodywork: Clearing Blocks, Knots and Lingering Mommy Issues

  Carolyn Jacques at Côte d'Azur

  Carolyn Jacques takes an amalga-mated kitchen-sink approach to bodywork. A Native American, she taps into the tribal healing techniques coursing through her veins, along with Maori (ouch!) modalities, Qigong, cord cutting, traditional massage, reflexology, aromatherapy and quantum healing. I met Jacques while in the throes of total Mercurial meltdown, having stumbled into her hands stinky, late and frazzled. Two hours… More >>

• Best Eastside Fashion: High-Low Style

  Sirens and Sailors

  Sirens and Sailors made the E.P. a wardrobe-stylist pit stop almost a decade ago, back when nobody actually lived there. Now that the entertainment-industry types and connoisseurs alike have invaded the area, Sirens endures as a post for high and low chic, with punky designs from local up-and-comers to more established innovators like Grey Ant and Vivienne Westwood. Even if… More >>

• Best Eastside Fashion: Block Party

  Show Pony's Monthly Art-and-Fashion Pony Show

  Show Pony, the fashion and art installation space, has been around nearly as long as S&S, and its laid-back artsy vibe is akin to rummaging through an eccentric pal's closet (and her acid-trip art explorations). Owner-artist Kime Buzelli not only has great taste, but she also has great energy, which makes shopping here a treat. The Pony knows how to… More >>

• Best Bodywork: Overall

  Julian Walker

  My real, true, honest injun' any day, everyday favorite is Julian Walker. His own body-mind integrative Big Sky Bodywork and compassionate fingers have the ability to move energy through my body like lightning bolts of sensation while guiding me to breathe the blocks out of my muscles myself. Of course, Walker is already in this issue for his yoga work… More >>

• Best Eastside Fashion: Indie-Rock High Fashion

  Front St.

  The edgy yet highly wearable designs of Endovanera have their home base right next to the Echoplex under the Sunset Boulevard bridge at designer David Hershberger and Mitch Moseley's shop Front St. The store often becomes a slackerama during the Echoplex's bigger shows, but the designs offered within are anything but haphazard — the sleek and smartly fitted trousers, jackets… More >>

• Best Bodywork: Best of the Best

  Tracy Feldstein

  Tracy Feldstein is a bodywork goddess. Trained in a zillion modalities, from Swedish deep tissue to Hawaiian lomilomi, her motto is "it feels good . . . when I stop." I could go on and on about her sensitive intuition, her Herculean strength, her dazzling personality and her cutting sense of humor, but what's the point? She's booked solid for… More >>

• Best Eastside Fashion: Recycled Retro

  Lemon Frog Shop

  Chock-full o' cuteness, the little charmer of a boutique called Lemon Frog Shop has the best selection of recycled retro on the Eastside, if not all of L.A. There's only one way to make absolutely sure you don't end up in the same frock as that headband-sporting (not) hottie at the Echo or the Short Stop. Ya gotta go vintage,… More >>

• Best Hands-On Healing

  One Healing's Jill Heinrich

  Jill Heinrich is a Westside massage therapist and Reiki master practicing at her One Healing studio in Brentwood. But calling her a massage therapist would be like saying Pavarotti was a crooner. Heinrich's work is more than routine massage; through bodywork, she explores the interconnectedness of energy with the body's own healing process, relying on Reiki and what she calls… More >>

• Best Eastside Fashion: Best-Edited Sample Sale

  The Circle

  There's always lots of new stuff to love at the Circle, which bills itself as an "indie-designer outlet." Imagine a bunch of different designer sample sales all under one roof, and you get the idea of this style sanctuary. There's tons to plow through here, including lots of under-the-radar local-designer stuff and better-known brands, like Rachel Pally, Trina Turk and… More >>

• Best SuperSexy Traction

  Leroy R. Perry Jr.'s Sportscience Institute

  Walking into Dr. Leroy Perry's International Sportscience Institute's '80s-opulent octagonal waiting room is like entering a time warp. Hanging above the emerald green carpet is a framed photograph of Elizabeth Taylor, circa 1986, dwarfed by puffy sleeves and shoulder pads, autographed with cursive adoration for Perry's multifaceted chiropractic prowess. Delving deeper into his institute's various treatment rooms and facilities lends… More >>

• Best Eastside Fashion: Handmade Fashion

  Matrushka Construction

  Dressy bessys who aren't stereotypical S'Lake waifs should check out Matrushka Construction, where each piece is handmade right there on the premises and tailored to fit if needed. The superflattering dress designs go for a little more than $100, but an equally fetching look-at-me T-shirt can be had for a lot less, and tailored in entirely different ways. The shop's… More >>

• Best Progressive Optimal-Health Tools: Detox

  iZO Cleanze

  It's L.A. There's a juice joint, an acupuncturist and a yoga studio on every corner. Everything's organic, everyone's eating right for their blood type and optimal health's yours for the taking. Just a few steps beyond the standard Reiki and Reishi regimes lie some of L.A.'s best stops on the road to wellness. Fasting is the most efficient way to detox;… More >>

• Best Place To Tee Up Change

  Clothing of the American Mind

  On a cool late Friday afternoon at Clothing of the American Mind in Echo Park, Carly Miller is explaining what makes for an effective political T-shirt. "First of all, you want it to be something that people want to wear," says the New York native who helped her friend, COTAM's founder Caitlin Blue, sell nearly 50,000 stylish political T-shirts online… More >>

• Best Progressive Optimal-Health Tools: Card Knowledge

  Tarot Study Group

  To heal the infinite wellspring that is your subconscious, head to Pacific Nexus Gallery/Temple of Thelema's Tarot Study Group, a bimonthly gathering in Venice. Led by the temple's bigwig Zeph Bender, the study group focuses on one of the Major Arcana (suits) of the Aleister Crowley–designed Thoth deck every other week, meditating on and deconstructing the cards' imagery, symbols, geometry,… More >>

• Best of the Fashion Free-For-Alls

  New Mart and Kukuly's

  Comprising more than 90 downtown blocks, the Fashion District can seem daunting. But if you can manage to find a parking spot — and walk away without a ticket — the day can be a resounding success when you know where to go. When the knock-offs start to make you delirious, head to the New Mart building on the last… More >>

• Best Boutique (on the Super Ghetto Cheap)

  Fashion Bank

  You've got a date to hike Runyon, you hate your wardrobe and you're broke. Don't panic. The little shop next to Trader Joe's on Santa Monica Boulevard at Fuller sells a decent selection of American Apparel seconds, among other various cotton-jersey wares, for a fraction of American Apparel prices. They have tees galore, for men and women — waffle henleys,… More >>

• Best Progressive Optimal-Health Tools: Crystal Consultant

  Nicole Hoegl

  If heady Hermetic occult orders aren't your thing, or even if they are, there's plenty of guidance to be found in the mineral world. Need protection from negative energy? Looking for clarity? Love? Abundance? Let personal crystal consultant Nicole Hoegl match you up with your perfect rock. Through meditation, an affinity with the mineral clusters and intuitive guidance, Hoegl homes… More >>

• Best Shops for Breaking Melrose Montony: Shopping Beyond 
the Grave

  Necromance

  Once the city's ultimate cutting-edge shopping mecca, Melrose Avenue has become more akin to downtown L.A.'s Santee Alley and Hollywood Boulevard over the past several years, a hodgepodge of hoochie wear, bongs, bellybutton rings and gaudy Ed Hardy gear. Higher-end designers like Marc Jacobs, Miss Sixty and Diesel may have chic'd up the street west of Fairfax, but walking east… More >>

• Best Progressive Optimal-Health Tools: Color Therapy

  Healing Waters

  After a harrowing shamanic ceremony in which I pulled handful after handful of dark, gooey matter out of my heart, I was suddenly in dire, desperate need of emerald green. Jennifer at Healing Waters helped me to find the perfect shade, in the perfect medium. From brightly hued color-therapy oils you apply to the body to ingestable tinctures that hold… More >>

• Best Shops for Breaking Melrose Montony: Best Hard Heads

  Headline Records

  Headline Records deserves props for both its tenacity (staying alive while every other indie record store has died) and its consistently killer selection of punk, ska, rock imports and independent releases. There's also spiked and studded stuff for punk stalwarts, many of whom still hang outside the place and spare-change ya, just like the bad 'ol days. Headline may not… More >>

• Best Progressive Optimal-Health Tools: Energy Center Tune-Up

  Charisse Landise

  Sometimes superfoods and shiatsu just aren't enough to balance you. Charisse Landise can tune up your energy centers with one of her mind-blowing chakra readings. OH MY GOD. Not only is Charisse supremely tapped in and clairvoyant up the yin-yang, but she also boasts ultrarefined translation skills, retrieving information about your innermost you from the outermost cosmos. She grounds that… More >>

• Best Shops for Breaking Melrose Monotony: Quickie Baubles

  So Good

  Go to So Good for the biggest and best selection of sparkly, cutesy and cheap costume jewelry. Yes, you can find a lot of this stuff priced even lower elsewhere, but when you need a quickie piece to add pow to an outfit (look for rhinestone hoops, enamel fruit pendants, giant bangles, crystal studs), this is your timesaving, one-stop shop.—Lina… More >>

• Best Progressive Optimal-Health Tools: Face Regeneration in a Jar

  Ascended Health's I Am Beautiful Oil

  You've tended to your inner landscape — now give a little love to your complexion. Ascended Health's I Am Beautiful facial-regeneration oil is the best all-natural face care product I've found. Oxygenated oils are infused with marine phytoplankton and healing herbs and imprinted with Lemurian quartz crystals. Yes, I'm serious. The potion is then bottled in the black glass and… More >>

• Best Shops for Breaking Melrose Monotony: Exotic Baubles

  Maya

  For a more exotic selection of baubles, as massive in scope as So Good, plus an amazing array of carved Asian and African masks, Maya is still a must. Its cases of silver charms, chains and hoops are always chock-stocked.—Lina Lecaro… More >>

• Best Party Line

  CUT-FOOT Hot Line

  There was life before text messaging. In L.A., there has been the enduring (310) CUT-FOOT hot line, a daily, two-minute-long recorded bulletin of some of the coolest events happening in the city. My experience with the hot line, now into my speed dial, was one of forgetting and then remembering when I saw it listed in an old issue of… More >>

• Best Shops for Breaking Melrose Monotony: Club Dressing

  Joy Rich

  Fashion-wise, there's not a lot in the area that transcends the club-clone look (flimsy Lycra dresses and sequined halters), but Joy Rich's colorful garb is a happy exception. Pieces from Brian Lichtenberg, Grey Ant, Unif, Arti Nero, Blank and the store's bold 'n' busy eponymous line (love the lip prints!) epitomize the '80s flava loved by electro and rock-lovin' hip… More >>

• Best Close-Up Magic Class

  Mark Wilson and Nani Darnell's Magic III

  The magazine Magic calls Mark Wilson one of the 10 most influential American magicians of modern times, in the same crowd as Houdini. And The New York Times says he's "probably this nation's leading authority on magic." Yet for the price of a couple of decent tickets to a ball game, you can enroll in a small advanced magic class… More >>

• Best Shops for Breaking Melrose Monotony: Living the Lifestyle

  
De La Barracuda

  Being hip, of course, isn't just about what you wear, it's about lifestyle. And no store in L.A. encompasses the culture like De La Barracuda. The 5,000-square-foot space offers unique street wear and T-shirts (its L.A.-logo shirts have become staples for skaters and ravers alike). But it's Barracuda's raging parties that put the shop — and Melrose itself — back… More >>

• Best Pit Bull Whisperer

  Kyle Schwab, Smashface Rescue

  Kyle Schwab's passion for underappreciated, misunderstood canines has gotten him in trouble over the years. It started during his senior year at Beverly Hills High School, when his father kicked him out of the house for bringing home a white boxer. In the years since, the former personal trainer, who's built like a human pit bull himself, has been incarcerated… More >>

• Best Shops for Breaking Melrose Monotony: Low-End Label Whoring

  Wasteland

  The easiest way to have your own unique style is to go vintage, and despite its sometimes bizarre — and bitchy — buying habits (ya gotta be really thick-skinned to sell your old clothes here these days), Wasteland still offers a good selection of used apparel, especially high-end labels. The new lines aren't much to get excited about, and the… More >>

• Best Weekend-Excess Redemption

  Griffith Park Composting Workshops

  When repenting is due after a weekend of rule-breaking, head to the hills for Griffith Park's composting workshops. On the fourth Saturday of every month, the park crew puts on morning classes that offer instruction in the best methods of composting for every type of home dweller. Come prepared to get your hands dirty and become one with the worms,… More >>

• Best Feel-Good Accessories

  Evolution Jewels

  Sacred geometry may be the new black, but how does the discerning metaphysical enthusiast integrate all those angles and dimensions and ratios into her daily life? Evolution Jewels provides high-end, gender-neutral jewelry designed according to sacred geometric principles. The beautiful gold, silver and platinum pieces vibe high and shine bright, guiding the well-accessorized wearer through transition and transformation, offering protection… More >>

• Best Music for Cars

  KXLU

  Phil Collins should never have been allowed to happen. I also don't need to hear "Love Come Down" three times a day — or ever, come to think of it. And "Maybe I'm Amazed" is brilliant, but Maybe I'm No Longer Amazed when it plays while I drive the same stretch of road at the same time on the same… More >>

• Best Stuff de France

  Charme D'Antan

  Thinking of adding a rock-hewn reflecting pond or moss-covered John Wayne-meets-Zen horse trough to your Hollywood bungalow side yard? Trying to soften the harsh, right-angle feel of your suddenly way-too-modern 1960s retro loft? Jacques Marque, the most affable Frenchman west of Anisette, can show you how. Not that it will be cheap. But far out on Mulholland Highway, past the horse… More >>

• Best Film School As Incendiary Device

  Inner-City Filmmakers

  Schmuel Gelbfisz would sit up in his platinum casket and the ghost of Jimmy Stewart would run down the Walk of Fame screaming, "It's a wonderful life" if they could see what was popping off at Inner-City Filmmakers. Ol' Schmuel (a.k.a. Samuel Goldwyn) never imagined this. I promise. ICF is an incendiary device designed to set kids on fire. Creatively combustible,… More >>

• Best Literary Mine

  Book Cellar

  Tucked along the far backside of the Santa Monica Mountains, there, among the native oaks and tall ash trees, just off a freeway frontage road that looks more like a state scenic drive, is the greatest and hardest-to-find used bookstore in Los Angeles or Ventura counties. Book Cellar, hidden in the basement of the Agoura Hills Library, has so many… More >>

• Best Place To Dress Like Miss Universe

  Tadashi

  Located in the South Coast Plaza shopping mall, just outside the upstairs corner of the fanciest Bloomingdale's this side of the Mississippi, is the unassuming Tadashi dress store. Blink and you'll miss it. That would be a big mistake, because Tadashi's are that rarest of dress breeds — sexy, timeless, basic, well constructed, comfortable, the kind you come back to… More >>

• Best Cheap Indian Stuff

  Govinda's

  Do you need to remove some obstacles, refresh your incense supply, deodorize your pits (without chemical additives), buy a beach cover-up and a housewarming gift, and eat, all for less than 50 bucks? Govinda's boutique, housed inside the International Society for Krishna Consciousness in West L.A., is your one-stop shop for Hindu deities, tulsi beads, bangles, kurtas and stackable stainless-steel… More >>