Meet the Therapists: Karly

"As a Licensed Massage Therapist, Registered Yoga Teacher, and student of Ayurveda, I use all three practices to help clients experience a calm and blissful state of balance. Massage sessions blend a variety of modalities and are designed to address each person’s needs and goals. Myofascial Release, Deep Tissue techniques, Swedish & Thai Massage, and Ayurvedic Body Therapies are the guiding influences behind my practice. Any modality can be emphasized if desired."


Karly teaches private yoga sessions and offers Integrated massage sessions at Apotheca. Please read our Yelp.com reviews to find out what her very happy clients have to say about their sessions with her. Here is a sneak peek from one of our favorites:

"Oh man! This cannot wait:

For more than a year I have had a painful problem with my neck and shoulder which has restricted the range of motion I have been able to turn my head. I just got back from my first session with Karly and BAM! I'm moving smooth and easy again! Suffice it to say, I consider myself one lucky chick!"

Be Your Own Apothecary: Rosemary and Tea Tree Foot Bath

This one is fabulous for you marathoners, hikers, and anyone who spends a lot of time on their feet. Use cool water for a refreshing feeling on a hot summer day. Or, for this crazy Winter in July we are getting this week in San Francisco, use very warm water to gently heat your feet and leave the whole body feeling bundled up and cozy.

Fresh rosemary is easy to find at your local grocery store and even at your local park. Take just a little sprig and you won't harm this very resilient plant. Rosemary has tonifying properties for the whole body. It is warming and analgesic (pain-killing), and revives the body and mind. Tea tree can't be beat for its antibacterial properties and helps deodorize tired feet like nothing else.

Are you ready for your foot bath? Here's how to do it:

• Put a sprig of fresh rosemary, broken into small pieces, into a large bowl, dishpan, or basin of water
• Add boiling water to draw out the good oils from the plant
• Let cool enough to comfortably touch.
• For a warm soak, just add 6-10 drops of Tea Tree essential oil and submerge your feet.
• If you prefer a cold soak, wait until your water has cooled and add ice before adding the Tea Tree oil.
• Soak your feet until they are nice and pink. Dry off and follow with a good moisturizer like 302 Skincare Body Treatment Intensive, which we love and sell at our office.

Don't forget our contest for a FREE Strategic Massage Session or Express Facial. Read how to enter here. We will be drawing a name at random this Friday, July 15 so enter now.

Number One on Yelp.com

Out of 1,428 massage and skincare places reviewed on Yelp.com in San Francisco, Apotheca Skin Body Wellness is ranked number 1 again this week.

Thank you, everyone, for sharing your positive experiences at Apotheca on Yelp, Citysearch, wherever. We truly appreciate your vote of confidence.

Practitioner: David Lesseps, Tui Na Massage Therapist

Update: Hooray! David has joined Apotheca to bring his fantastic Tui Na work to our menu!

I've been David's acupuncture patient for the better part of a year and my frequent sessions with him have played a bigger part in helping my physical and spiritual health than any other medical of therapeutic work I have done. I recommend him wholeheartedly to all my friends and massage and skincare clients who are interested in Traditional Chinese Medicine. So when he told me he was taking his Tui Na practice to the Mission I jumped at the chance to schedule a session with him. I'm so glad I did. My session was wonderfully thorough and effective, and the tight shoulders and creaky back I walked in with were loose and fluid when I left his table and went out into the world an hour later. The work is energizing as well as deeply relaxing, and his office is airy, light and calming. I'm eagerly looking forward to my next session. I'm so glad to have David in the cadre of practitioners I visit regularly to keep me feeling well and happy.

(This entry was originally a Yelp.com review.)

Practioner: Ravena Feldman, Craniosacral Therapist

I had my first Craniosacral session with Ravena Feldman this past week and it was heavenly. I'm an unrepentant holistic treatment junkie and I've had all kinds of therapeutic work-- the proverbial good, bad and sadly ineffective. This session was something very new and wonderful for me. It was my first craniosacral session ever, and I'm still feeling the effects of it, still feeling dreamy and soft and energized and vibrant.

Craniosacral work is unlike manual massage therapy. To learn more about it, take a peek atthis website.

Ravena is a wonderfully competent, capable, confident practitioner. I had come into my appointment from a crazy hectic day, and the minute I stepped through the front door and into her calm and happy presence I felt relaxed and happy myself. The session itself was wonderful. Ravena was able to zero in on the exact areas where I was holding tension and where my body was feeling less than energized. She used quiet, meditative, very light touch and I quickly went from heart-pumping caffeinated go-go-go Kirsten to softly snoring Kirsten, lone resident of Blissland, pop: Me. As I left, she gave me some simple exercises for increasing energy and fertility (two issues I'd requested we address in my session) and sent me out into the world calm, breathing deeply, and unable to stop smiling at everyone I passed.

That smiley freak you passed in the Mission on Thursday? That was me. Thanks to Ravena.

(This entry was originally a Yelp.com review.)

Giving: Addicted to Kiva

This past week I made another donation on Apotheca's behalf. Kiva is seriously addictive!! Where I used to enjoy shopping for books and music and vintage housewares online, now I can't get enough of finding small business to fund. I love supporting various people in developing countries in their endeavors to start businesses to feed and house their families.

Why is Kiva so compelling? For one thing, I like the idea of using globalization in a positive way. I look at Kiva as the anti-Walmart, an entity made up of thousands of people who want to build up rather than destroy mom-and-pop shops around the world. That resonates with me, being part of a small-fry practice myself. But what it really comes down to is that I live in a place I love doing work I adore. I never forget how lucky I am, and I want to share my good fortune wherever I can.

So this time, we are supporting Nicholas Matata Mukosi in Nairobi, Kenya. He is a 39-year old father of four who requested a loan to buy stock for his small grocery store. We are also lending to Kim-heak Chhim in Kean Svay district, Cambodia. She is a mother of three who sells flowers in the local village. Her husband hires himself out to do freelance tractor work in the local farms. The couple has requested the loan to put toward repairing their house.

For anyone looking for a wonderful way to give back to the global community, I wholeheartedly endorse kiva.org. Check them out. But be careful...it's addictive!

Music: "The underground is in the living room"

I'm so excited to have received my big order of new music from my friends at Dynamophone Records this morning. Those of you who have come in for massage and facial treatments have probably experienced some of this wonderful little local label's beautiful indy offerings in the studio. I was inspired to visit their web site and do some shopping after live listening party put on by Dynamophone's music community resource, Ixmae. The event was at Poleng Lounge, and it featured some of the prettiest and most inventive music I have heard in a long time. The highlight for me was Zoe Keating, a "one-woman string quartet" who uses live electronic samples as she plays to create a lush ensemble sound that really must be experienced to be believed.

Heavenly music. The next time you are in for a visit, listen up and you will likely hear some lovely Dynamophone tunes. I am glad as ever to live in a community full of creative people doing such interesting projects. It's a pleasure to support this local label. And now I'm off to open that box and have a listen.

Products and Ingredients: Sea Turtles and Sun in Oahu

Aloha Apotheca people! I had the great pleasure of visiting the North Shore of Oahu at the beginning of the month. The white sand and the blue water, the scent of plumeria flowers and the warm tropical sun (especially wonderful to this fogged-in San Francisco girl) were every bit as dreamy a tropical paradise as I would have hoped. As a skincare professional I was of course obsessive about sun protection while away, but despite my best efforts at staying safe while hiking and body surfing and hanging out with a mai tai in the shade, the sun got to me after a while. So I decided to check out Turtle Bay Resorts' fancy-schmancy spa for some pampering post-sun skincare.

The spa uses Epicuren products exclusively. The highlight of my treatment was the Chai Soy Mud mask, used to help purify my poor sunscreen-clogged pores and give my skin some plump and firmness. It felt and smelled terrific, but reading the ingredients afterward I saw that the product was not as safe and natural as I would have hoped, and that the third ingredient in it is. . . talc. Yuck! Didn't we stop using talc a long time ago? It's a known irritant and it's a proven carcinogen. Not a product I would choose or use on my self or my clients. While I enjoyed the treatment tremendously (who doesn't love being primped to nirvana in front of a window overlooking the Pacific?) I was made more confident in my choice of product lines and treatment procedures when all was said and done.

The other nice thing that happened while I was gone is that I rekindled my love of kukui and coconut oils. I love a good coconut oil massage, especially for the scalp, as in the Ayurvedic tradition. So I am working on some lovely services to offer in the fall and winter, when we can all use a bit more tropical warmth in our lives.