Museums for all: Familiar with a Fisherman Wharf’s museum devoted to the science of sight? Me neither. But the Truhlsen-Marmor Museum of the Eye is among 21 cultural treasures offering free admission December 3 and 4.
Announced in early November, San Francisco Free Museum Weekend attracted more than 65,000 online-only reservations in just one week (sffreemuseumweekend.com). However, day-of tickets remain.
The Weekend, organized by the Asian Art Museum, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco and SFMOMA, allows intrepid aficionados to book multiple museums as time — and geography — permit. Options range from high-priced heavyweights like the California Academy of Sciences and Walt Disney Family Museum to jewel boxes such as the Letterform Archive and GLBT Historical Society Museum.
This civic gift is thanks to deep-pocketed donors who will cover all entry fees. While these art angels remain anonymous, it’s whispered that they grew weary of a national narrative bashing our EssEff art scene. So they’re funding open doors to share that inherent vibrancy with all comers.
Stocking stuffers: On the hunt for unique gifts to give San Francitizens on your list? The City provides. With his band, The Gas Men, storied musician-singer-songwriter Vince Keehan, a County Galway native by way of decades in the Sunset, is a linchpin of the local Irish music scene. Now he’s garnering rave reviews for his latest album, Great Highway. Recorded during pandemic lockdown, his soulful tunes are inspired by a life of craic, love, loss, travels and the Ocean Beach walkway he rambles with his wife, Missy Keehan, and their dog, Whiskey.
Or consider partying with a purpose — and a new, unwrapped gift — on December 3 as Value Culture founder Adam Swig hosts his swinging Hanukkah in Paris soiree at Le Colonial to benefit the U.S. Marine Corps’ Toys for Tots program.
And if you’re anticipating expiation of holiday excess, EssEff native Liza Cannata, a nutritionist and author of the Three Hungry Boys blog, has your back — and stomach. This fall, she launched her inaugural cookbook, Salad Love: The Simple Art of Making a Great Salad (designed by pal Alyssa Warnock). From sides to mains, the 45 recipes will kick-start healthful resolutions.
Pas de beaucoup: On December 8, the Sugar Plum Fairy, the Mouse King and little Clara star at the War Memorial Opera House for 33 performances in a San Francisco Ballet holiday treat: Nutcracker. This beloved — and mammoth — production, by former artistic director Helgi Tomasson, features 83 company dancers and 110 SF Ballet School students. On December 21, the Ballet mounts its first sensory-friendly performance in collaboration with the Autism Society San Francisco Bay Area. Special accommodations are implemented to welcome neurodiverse patrons.
Haute ticket: Buzz is building for the ninth edition of Fog Design+Art next month at Fort Mason Center for the Arts. The fair runs January 19–23 with a January 18 preview gala — chaired by collectors Komal Shah and Gaurav Garg — benefiting SFMOMA. Forty-eight local and international galleries (including David Zwirner, Marian Goodman, Fraenkel, Berggruen and Crown Point Press) showcase a heady mix of contemporary and 20th-century objets.
On January 19, the Innovators Lunch honors celebrated songbird Linda Ronstadt and her new cookbook, Feels Like Home: A Song for the Sonoran Borderlands. And Fog cofounder Stanlee Gatti echoes that Southwestern theme in his 21POP pavilion featuring the meticulous craftsmanship of Indigenous jewelry artisans.
Holiday eats: There’s no more frantic time for a baker to open a new business than amid the frenzy of holiday orders. But last month, Amanda Michael, founder of the expansive Jane cafe and bakery empire, did just that. “After acquiring Toy Boat, another legacy business, I thought, why stop there?” she says with a laugh.
Michael was approached by Sweet Things founders Marsha Lasky and Sharon Leach, who, after meeting 45 years ago at Joseph Magnin and joining forces to establish their beloved Tiburon bakery and Laurel Village CalMart counter, were ready to retire.
“Our businesses are complementary, with differences,” says Michael. “We’ll expand our Jane breads across the bridge. And Sweet Things produces items we can’t bake in bulk, especially their classic carrot cake and always sold-out bûche de noël. It’s really rad these two women created such a successful business with great infrastructure and a huge commercial space in San Rafael.”
Michael retained all employees at the bakery, rebranded as Jane’s Sweet Things — some tenured more than 30 years. Now with six retail cafes and two commercial bakeries, she is one of the area’s most dynamic small business owners and provides jobs for 150 employees. (A long way from when she opened Jane on Fillmore in 2011 with a staff of eight.)
Doing business in San Francisco is not without its drama, however. “We’re blessed with great customers and staff. But at Jane in the Tenderloin, every day I see the human wreckage caused by a broken city government that’s dominated by special interests,” shares Michael, a fifth-gen San Franciscan. “I love our city — always have, always will. Is it perfect? No. I’m not a politician. I just bake bread to make people happy.”
