San Francisco Health & Beauty

Walk into this crisp white studio adorned with lush flowers, exquisite trinkets, and Monastery’s line of gorgeously scented, super-effective skincare, and instantly, you feel restored. A facial with founder and formulator Athena Hewett takes you to a new level, however: She customizes each step to your skin, deftly combining the traditional exfoliation, cleansing, and extractions with high tech treatments and ancient techniques. Athena’s personally trained every one of the expert estheticians on staff; you saunter out sculpted, glowing, and completely rejuvenated.

If you aren’t familiar with the Akashic records, they are most simply described as a nonphysical library that contains information about every soul’s past, present, and future possibilities. Sounds overwhelming, right? But Amor Luz Pangilinan, an Akashic reader, helps provide a direct connection to this metaphysical plane by either accessing them for you or helping you expand your own intuition so that you can enter and navigate the records on your own (everyone, he says, can access them through practice).

All the treatments at Roha are based on ancient Ayurveda practices to help restore energy, detoxify, release stress, and enhance wellness. The downtown San Francisco spot is all about full mind-body rejuvenation, with personalized protocols that include dietary adjustments, herbal remedies, and oil therapy treatments. If you’re not looking to make any lifestyle changes, the nourishing, warm-body-oil massage will leave you immediately relaxed and recharged.

Any facialist worth their salt can make you glow after a treatment, but Kristina Holey’s aim is to bring skin into long-term balance. This means that each treatment begins with a thorough dissection of eating habits, skin-care routine, and general lifestyle and ends with a detailed homework assignment for everyday maintenance. There’s no menu at her airy, laid-back studio; the one and a half to two hours she spends with clients are completely customized, though all include a rousing face massage, as well as broths meant to calm and strengthen skin from within.

The Facial Acupuncture treatment targets specific points for a sculpting effect, and we recommend adding on cupping, jade rolling, or gua sha.

We love this sleek, supremely restful spa so much that we even sell goop skin care here. The facials are superb; the Organic Detox is an invigorating forty-five minutes of lymphatic-drainage massage, balance-restoring herb and flower masks, and layer upon layer of the most nourishing serums and oils. And we’re equally obsessed with Bright Eyes, a powerful collagen-supporting therapy for the undereye area that soothes and tightens. The lounge has a cozy fireplace, as well as organic teas and delightful chocolates to nosh on while relaxing. The outside deck, with its lounge chairs and incredible view of the bay, is a blissful way to ease back into reality post-treatment.  

UCSF offers both clinical inpatient and outpatient care for adolescents up to twenty-five years old suffering from anorexia, bulimia, and other eating disorders. The program incorporates medical, psychiatric, and nutritional services, as well as Eating Disorder-Intensive Family Treatment. ED-IFT was created with research from UC San Diego, and it gives family members tools to help their loved ones successfully navigate the program.

We love how this streamlined boutique exudes the perfect mix of rockstar edginess and eco-consciousness–the latter being obvious on its shelves that are stocked with some of our favorite natural beauty brands including Vintner's Daughter, Rahua, and our very own goop by Juice Beauty. A full service salon anchors the space, where you can find some of the city's best colorists and stylists.

Juliana does acupuncture, cupping, herbal work, and fantastic massage. She's also well known for her excellent bedside manner; she's kind, warm, and a pleasure to be around, which makes the entire experience all the more pleasant.

Tempel Smith started studying Buddhism and meditation in 1989 and even spent a year in Burma as an ordained Theravadan monk; after which he studied in silence for nine months (talk about commitment). He also completed a four-year teacher training program at Spirit Rock, where he learned a particular brand of somatic healing called Somatic Experiencing that's a powerful healing tool for people with PTSD. Though Smith does Dharma teaching and much of his work has its foundation in Buddhist principles, his somatic healing methods are firmly secular.