News about great shops in your neighborhood

In Perfect Formation

Jennifer Piedra’s overcome a lot of obstacles since moving to the U.S. as a teenager from Taiwan. But after mastering English, and then the art of representing brand-name manufacturing for big clothing lines, she broke out on her own to open Formation in Albany in August 2005.

Piedra’s one cool cat: her line of merchandise includes Hu Hu Cat and Cool Dogs items for the younger set (backpacks and school supplies) and the Hot Cats line for teens and adults (mechanical pencils, purses, and handbags). “We really like cats,” Piedra purrs. In fact, some of the shop’s hair accessories–pendant clips, for example–are made from, naturally, cat’s-eye stones.

Formation features products from the practical–a sensor trash can that opens when you approach and mechanical pencils with built-in cap sharpeners–to the decorative–character figurines and wood carvings. There are also divinely nonpractical essentials, like strings of pearls with 14K gold clasps and sterling silver accessories. Since Piedra deals directly with most of her manufacturers, prices are low: fashion necklaces run $9.95, or $15.95 with a set of earrings.

Formation, 835 San Pablo Avenue, Albany, (510) 528-3993; www.formationamerica.com.

Please Don’t Eat the Dainties

“If our things were edible, we’d be a giant candy store,” gushes Susan Lemmon of Juniper Tree. Lemmon’s store–a new location on Lakeshore Avenue as well the soap and candle supplies store in Berkeley–is heavy on the whimsy, and unapologetically girly.

Juniper has everything from bath and beauty products, to lingerie, slippers, and robes. “We want you to walk in and be surrounded by pretty, glittery things,” says Lemmon. To that end, the store also carries its own bath salts, soap, and skin-care lines. There are also a number of well-known bath-product lines like Thymes, Gianna Rose, Pré de Provence, and Mor, as well as lingerie-makers Mary Green and Pine Cone Hill pajamas.

Longtime customers are also familiar with the folks behind the counter, creating what Lemmon calls “one big happy family.” Juniper is a special favorite when Cupid comes a-calling in February, with piles of jewelry, mostly costume and casual. Clients go crazy over the candles and high-end soaps, says Lemmon, who herself is a rather exotic import to the East Bay from her native New Mexico. She’s been in the retail business for 15 years now, and has found her niche, some-where between whimsy and want, decadence and desire.

Juniper Tree, 3303 Lakeshore Avenue, Oakland, (510) 444-4650.

Wish on a Star

Want to make the move up from baseball cards and rock and roll posters? Art of the Stars gives you the opportunity to “put something cooler on the wall,” says owner Robb Holub. With a background in investments, Holub began the business two years ago and is now an authorized dealer and distributor for the artwork of renowned sports artist Stephen Holland, as well as rock and rollers Ronnie Wood (Rolling Stones) and Grace Slick (Jefferson Airplane/Starship).

Like Holub, many buyers of celebrity artwork look at it as both an investment and the continuation of a childhood obsession–be it the jocks who are into Muhammad Ali (Holland is the authorized artist for Ali’s estate and was named “Sports Artist of the Year” in 1993 by the American Sports Art Museum), or the rockers who jammed to the Stones in its heyday. “The common denominator is that they’re getting a piece of a childhood icon,” says Holub, who has a Slick portrait of Jerry Garcia hanging in his own home. All the celebrity and sports artists focus on creating limited-editions and they always sell out.

Slick, singer of the Summer-of-Love hit “White Rabbit,” also dedicates much of her painting to her muse, Alice in Wonderland.

So whether it’s a portrait of Joe Montana, Keith Richards, or the Mad Hatter, Art of the Stars is a place where you can indulge your youthful dreams of fame, fortune, or fancy.

Art of the Stars, 1941 San Ramon Valley Boulevard, San Ramon, (925) 838-6260; www.artofthestars.com.

Soaked Skin Deep

“Give your skin some credit,” says Jennifer Bowers of Soak It In Skin Care Studio in Berkeley. Skin, she says, is the body’s hardest-working organ–and a very underappreciated one at that. Think about it: Your skin covers every inch of you, and protects you. What are you doing for it in return?

Soak It In’s philosophy of skin care and protection is based on individual analysis and treatment. Before your first treatment begins, Bowers interviews you with a series of questions about your lifestyle, diet, and the environmental factors that may affect your skin. Her 90-minute appointments ($120) include head, facial, and foot massage, and healing through La Stone Therapy, which utilizes heated and chilled stones on the body to balance the nervous system. “It’s a deeply relaxing revitalization session,” says Bowers. “I don’t offer treatments from a menu. I work with each individual to create a treatment on the spot. Everybody’s skin and needs are unique.”

Bowers notes that up to 60 percent of what we apply to our skin is absorbed through the epidermis and into the bloodstream. This is why Soak It In uses and sells the locally-produced Marie Veronique line of natural skin-care products because, Bowers says, “the ingredients are clean and preservative free.” Bowers is also the only independent skin-care therapist in the East Bay using the Naturopathica aromatherapy line.

Is beauty really only skin deep? Well, it’s your body’s most visible and hard-working organ, so why not give it the luxurious care it deserves.

Soak It In Skin Care Studio, Berkeley, (510) 898-8987; www.soakitin.com. By appointment only.

Faces of the East Bay