Shopping in San Francisco

City Lights is one of the landmarks in San Francisco. An independent bookstore specialized in world literature, arts, politics and alternative culture. If you love books, this is one of the bookstores in the world to visit.

My favorite bookstore, ever! In the "new chinatown" or "little chinatown" neighborhood, which is packed with good restaurants, Green Apple has two stores right next to eachother, one is a new bookstore, with tons of books and a special focus on local interest, and the other is a used bookstore with some records -- you have to dig a bit in the back, but it is usually worth it.
Great prices on both new and used stuff.
Open daily 10:00am-11:30pm.

A gourmet paradise inside the renovated Ferry Building. Walk around restaurants, delis, gourmet coffee shops, specialty foods, breads, olive oils, wine, cheeses. Authentic California food. No chain stores. Everything in this cozy place is there for you to taste.

Gigantic SF record store with a shocking number of used records, normally at a decent price. A record collector's first stop. They have a good deal of turnover with the used records -- go more than once and you're likely to find some treasures. They also have DVDs, laser discs, posters, CDs and tapes.

Oh, and an important note for collectors - be sure to ask if you can check out the rare singles behind the counter. They're organized by genre.

Open daily 10:30-10:00.

Located in San Francisco's Japantown, Super 7 is a Japanese toy shop that also has art and counter culture books and t-shirts. If you're a toy collector you probably already know them; they also publish a magazine. If not it's a great place to go to see some freaky toys.
When I was there I saw an old school Japanese fire-spitting Godzilla toy.

A cool little independent record store in the mission. Friendly folks and a good selection and variety of styles. The staff is knowledgeable and approachable, and they have some great in-house-reviews on a scattered selection of records that are worth paying attention to.

Open Monday-Wednesday 10am-9pm
Thursday-Sunday 10am-10pm

This is a small neighborhood and shopping center is filled with shops with items from Japan.

The stationery store in the shopping center has some of the most elegant notebooks I've ever seen, along with cute little stickers and envelopes, etc. There are Japanese restaurants inside the shopping center, and a very cool dollar store as well.

You can find asian fruits and vegetables in the grocery store for a good price as well as different snacks and teas.

A cute little art gallery and zine shop. A good place to buy independent art and find a new zine.
They also have arts and crafts and some clothing.