Category Archives: New York Times

May 11, 2008

Jazz and sushi seem at first an unusual combination, but in the San Francisco Bay area they are inextricably linked, thanks to Yoshi’s.

Yoshi’s, a Berkeley sushi joint opened in 1973 by Kaz Kajimura, Hiro Hori and Yoshi Akiba, featured jazz from the start. In the 1990s, when Oakland was redeveloping its waterfront, Mr. Kajimura moved Yoshi’s into a new space that was built for it, which included a much bigger restaurant and an intimate custom theater. It was a big hit, quickly becoming a regular stop on West Coast tours.

Read it on the NYT site…

HEADS UP | TONALÁ, MEXICO

April 13, 2008

AVENIDA Independencia runs west from the central square in Tlaquepaque, Mexico. For several blocks it is a pedestrian street, cobbled and lined with ornate mansions that, more than a century ago, served as weekend homes for the elite of Guadalajara. Today, they are shops featuring high-end wares for other weekend homes throughout the continent.

They make things easy: they have good selections, and they’ll happily pack up your handblown glasses and carved headboard and ship them to you, or even arrange custom orders. But prices rival those in the United States. For those with a serious love of shopping, and on the lookout for deals — especially on artisanal goods like pottery, ironwork, glass and furniture — it’s worth leaving the calm elegance of Tlaquepaque for the exuberant chaos of nearby Tonalã.

Tonalã is where the professionals shop. I visited with Rebecca Allen, an interior designer based in San Francisco, who has been making regular buying trips to Tonalã for more than a decade. She is part of an ancient tradition: the town, near rich clay seams, has been a center of pottery — and of trade more broadly — for millenniums. It remains one of Mexico’s top artisanal hubs; the streets are lined with shops and ateliers, and a complex at its heart features nothing but earthenware.

Read it on the NYT site…

March 9, 2008

There’s something about Los Angeles that has kept the latest wave of fine specialty coffee at bay. So the August opening of Intelligentsia Coffee in Silver Lake, complete with some imported Pacific Northwest baristas, was a quantum leap.

The shop, on a busy stretch of Sunset Boulevard, is a bold stab westward by the Chicago-based Intelligentsia Coffee and Tea. The bright space is divided into an outdoor seating area, for lounging with a laptop, and an indoor workshop with counter-only seating for focused caffeine administration.

Read it on the NYT site…