Ever-evolving business an the heart of Tam Junction begins celebration with an art show on Saturday in San Francisco and a series of local anniversary events on the way.


Proof Lab, the surf and skate shop that has grown into the multi-faceted community epicenter of Tam Junction and is celebrating its 10-year anniversary with an art show in San Francisco Saturday and a series of events this fall, came from decidedly humble beginnings.

Mill Valley native Nate McCarthy and San Anselmo native Will Hutchinson, friends who’d met while working at Marin Surf Sports in Tam Junction, decided to open their own surf shop in a tiny 600-square-foot space in the small Poplar Plaza shopping center near the 7-Eleven on Shoreline Highway. The pair had driven a truck to southern California, bought as much surfing equipment and apparel that they could afford, and filled the tiny shop to the brim (see photos above).

Ten years on, the Mill Valley residents have built a mini-empire whose scale is overshadowed only by its variety and its clear vision for how to build community. Across 15,000 square feet at the corner of Shoreline Hwy. and Almonte Blvd., Proof Lab and its partners and subtenants have taken what was once a tiny surf shop and turned it into a hub that includes the Proof Lab surf and skate shop, the Proof Lab Station outdoor apparel shop, an indoor skate park, the Mill Valley Potter’s Studio, music lessons, a biodiesel station, the Little Art Studio and the CNL Native Plant Nursery, not to mention Equator Coffees at Proof Lab, whose arrival in 2013 made the space even more of a gathering spot.

“There was a lot of interest and motivation to make something good and different (in 2004), but the definition of that has changed over time as our intentions and our understanding of the world has changed – it’s been a process,” Hutchinson says.

“It’s all been about the same thing – great retail, building community, and connecting people with the arts and outdoors – but that has gone in a lot of different directions depending on what we’ve gotten into and what space has become available,” he adds.

Proof Lab’s biggest leap came in 2011. Although their business was growing at a healthily steady clip, the longstanding availability of a 10,000-square-foot warehouse that had previously been occupied by Webster Gears became enticing.

“It was a huge risk,” Hutchinson says. “The idea had been to take a leap and absorb some more space and hope the business catches up to that and then exceeds it. But this was a huge move – it was a re-invention.”

That changed everything.

It allowed Proof Lab to move the traditional surf and skate shop into the new space and add the skate park, rooms for music lessons and significantly more storage for inventory. And it allowed to put what is now Proof Lab Station – and outdoor apparel shop that features brands like Patagonia, Filson and Pendleton – in the former gas station space right on Shoreline.

Soon thereafter, the pair leased another 3,000 square feet in a partnership with the dog kennel and grooming business AlphaDog. Launching with a pumpkin patch around Halloween 2011, the venture became the GROW Art & Garden Center, testing a variety of community-oriented ideas. They eventually coalesced into three independent subtenants – Mill Valley Potter’s Studio, Little Art Studio and the CNL Native Plant Nursery.

Two years later, with Equator Coffees & Teas looking to expand their well-established wholesale business with some retail cafes, co-owner Helen Russell and Hutchinson connected on the long-vacant space on the streetfront side of the property. Equator has taken Proof Lab’s distinct sense of community to another level, Hutchinson says.

"Our partnership with Proof Lab has exceeded our expectations - Will and Nate have built a very special business that focuses on the local community, our shared values of making an impact and connection has made for a very special collaboration," Russell says.

The ability of McCarthy and Hutchinson to evolve their business, and their moves over the past three years in particular, have drawn rave reviews, including from both their landlord and their subtenants.

“I love them both to death,” says George Kim, whose family owns the entire property that includes Proof Lab and its partners and subtenants, about McCarthy and Hutchinson. “I love the way they approach business. They’re very community oriented – just great guys. And every year it seems there’s something new that they want to do – it’s a great story.”

For the latest new thing, Proof Lab has looked beyond their space in Tam Junction, building an outdoor public skate park in Marin City. They're in the midst of a Kickstarter campaign to pay for it, with Proof Lab matching its $5,000 goal. "It could be a really good thing for Southern Marin as we don't have a good public skate park right now," Hutchinson says. 

Jhaya Warmington, an artist and art teacher, met Hutchinson and McCarthy through friends, and jumped at the chance to open Little Art Studio for children as young as 18 months.

“It was a wonderful opportunity,” Warmington says. “To be able to an art program like this in the community when rents are so high is really difficult. But they’ve been so supportive, and they’ve really been mentors for those of us who’ve started these businesses but didn’t understand how to run a business in the beginning.”

For Hutchinson, there was never a blueprint for what the brand and the property would become. Instincts and a bit of serendipity have certainly helped.

“Our interests and our thinking has changed over time,” he says. “When we started all this, we weren’t thinking about biodiesel and ceramics and music lessons and coffee. But none of it’s a surprise either. It all makes sense now and it all feels right.”

The 411: On Saturday, Sept. 27 at 6pm, Proof Lab kicks off its 10-year Anniversary Celebration with a 'Living in Transition' Art Show at Ian Ross Gallery, 466 Brannan St., San Francisco. The show features a host of artists that have worked with Proof Lab directly over the years or indirectly through one of the brands the shop carries, including locals like Zio Ziegler and Mike Shine. The show runs through Oct. 15. Click here for more info.

For Tam Valley residents pining for the neighborhood grocery store they’ve been missing since December 2010, the wait is over. Well, almost.

Fairfax-based organic foods market Good Earth Natural Foods confirmed their long-in-the-works plans to open a second location in Marin, this time in the 26,000-square-foot space at 207 Flamingo Road that has been vacant since DeLano's IGA Market closed the week of Dec. 17, 2010, one of five DeLano's markets in Marin and San Francisco that shut down as part of a mass eviction of the struggling grocery chain.

Good Earth officials said they are in the planning stages of an "total renovation and aesthetic transformation" of the building under the guidance of Santa Cruz-based C/D/M Crocker-Fry, which designed and built Good Earth's Fairfax store. They are projecting that the store will open in Fall 2015.

Good Earth opened in 1969 at 123 Bolinas Avenue in Fairfax. In response to growing demand, the company moved to 1966 Sir Francis Drake Blvd. at the end of 2000, and opened its current 22,000-square-foot store in Fairfax store in February 2012 "to meet the needs of our customers who requested a larger store with more selection store-wide, wider aisles, additional check-out stands, and indoor seating."

“We have received many requests for a store in Southern Marin from folks seeking a more organic choice,” said Mark Squire, one of two partners at Good Earth. “Although organic food is still a bit pricier, we know that enough people recognize the superior quality and safety of organic food to support a store with Good Earth's commitment. We look forward to serving a new community with healthful food.”

“Along with meeting the additional market demand for what we already do, it also brings me great pleasure knowing our staff will continue to grow too - this opportunity represents real leadership growth opportunities for many current Good Earthlings,” Partner Al Baylacq added.

Good Earth officials are asking potential 94941 customers to take this survey about their new store as they seek to gather feedback on the community's priorities.

From mobile phones to tablets and millions of apps in between, technology is ubiquitous, and our kids’ mastery of it never fails to astound us.

But are they mastering one of the most basic functions of our digital world?

Typing, a skill that dates back to the mid-1800s in Wisconsin, is the focus of one of the newest businesses in the 94941. Barbara Schmidt’s TypeA+, which launched in Santa Rosa three years ago, opened an education center in Tam Junction earlier this month.

Schmidt, a longtime CPA who has worked for giants like KPMG, started TypeA+ because she noticed a trend among her three kids, their friends and her friends’ kids: most of them were struggling to proficient at typing.

“It didn’t seem to dawn on many parents that there was a solution,” Schmidt says. “And kids thought they actually knew the skill and the parents thought they were getting it in school – but it wasn’t happening.”

With some guidance from the Typing Institute of America, Schmidt developed a curriculum that centers on teaching children in grades 2 to 8 how to type with speed and accuracy and avoid developing bad habits that are hard to break once they become adults.

“We’ve got to get them young – when they’re eager to learn and they haven’t learned a lot of bad habits,” Schmidt says. “

Schmidt licensed proprietary software that allows her teacher to monitor students’ progress through 24 50-minute small group classes, with the software itself allowing students to pick up where they left off if they miss a session or two.

“We’re able to tailor the speed to any grade level and make it fun, with prizes, games and rewards,” she says.

TypeA+ is hosting a Grand Opening Celebration, with food and drinks and a Ribbon Cutting Ceremony with the Mill Valley Chamber of Commerce, from 4pm–6pm on Thursday, August 28 at its education center at 247 Shoreline Highway, Unit B6 – in the shopping center that contains Mathnasium and the San Francisco Running Company. Click here for more info on TypeA+.

Despite being a town of just shy of 14,000 people, Mill Valley is home to a plethora of distinct neighborhoods, each with its own topography, history and character. Residents of each can tick off a laundry list of their attributes, often drawing a contrast from those neighborhoods around them.

Pacific Union estate agent Katrina Kehl – whose job it is to match would-be Mill Valley residents with a neighborhood and a home that matches their desires – has created a visual look at nine of those neighborhoods, each with its own lengthy caption to spell out their respective traits, in the form of postcards.

Drawing inspiration from a ribald 2012 slideshow from the Bold Italic on San Francisco neighborhoods for people looking to move to the City by the Bay, Kehl reached out to her friend Tom LaMar about designing a 94941-specific series.

“I thought it was the funniest thing – it was a bit too snarky for my business but it was spot on,” Kehl says of the Bold Italic series. “I thought it might be fun and interesting to people in general to do one for Mill Valley.

“So this is my take on these neighborhoods,” adds Kehl, who has lived in Mill Valley here for 21 years and currently lives in the Northridge neighborhood across Camino Alto from Scott Valley. “Each of these neighborhoods has a personality just like San Francisco’s neighborhoods do.”

The illustrations and captions live on Kehl’s blog, which she uses to add some personality and slice-of-life flair. She’s thinking about turning them into a physical postcard series. Let her know in the Comments below if you’d be interested in them, or if you’d like to nominate a neighborhood she hasn’t covered in the first series.

Dozens of local and regional leaders, as well as a bevy of bicyclists and bike-ped advocates, turned out on June 27 for a dedication and ribbon-cutting ceremony for the Charles F. McGlashan Pathway, named for the former Marin County Supervisor who passionately advocated for nonmotorized transportation options.

The paved bike-pedestrian pathway, which has had sections opened to the public gradually since 2012, runs along the southern bank of Coyote Creek for about half a mile from its intersection with the Mill Valley-Sausalito Multiuse Path to the intersection of Tennessee Valley Road and Marin Avenue. The path is in District 3, the district represented by McGlashan from 2004 until his death in 2011.

The ceremony took place at the Log Cabin at 60 Tennessee Valley Road in Tam Valley, with former U.S. Rep Lynn Woolsey, Mill Valley Mayor Stephanie Moulton-Peters, Supervisor Kathrin Sears and Tamalpais Community Service District President Jeff Brown, among others, in attendance.

Initial funding for the pathway was secured by Woolsey and former Marin County Supervisor Annette Rose. Later, the pathway became a key part of the Nonmotorized Transportation Pilot Program (NTPP), a federal program begun in 2005 that launched Marin and three other U.S. communities in a nationwide program to reduce car trips by promoting safe bike and walking options. McGlashan once reassured a local resident that the pathway would be built so children could get out of Tam Valley to the Mill Valley-Sausalito Greenway and up to local schools. 

“It has been a long hard project to get this designed and cleared for permits … and we’re close,” he said at the time.

McGlashan saw the pathway not just as a practical and safe means to get around the community, away from cars and busy roads, but as a way to get people of all ages into nature to enjoy the beauty of Coyote Creek and the scenic views of forested hills. “For Charles, it was about bringing people together,” said Andy Peri of the Marin County Bicycle Coalition.

Before McGlashan died while on vacation in March 2011, he was renowned for boundless energy, passion and the promotion of projects aimed at reducing Marin’s greenhouse gas emissions. His achievements included the formation of Marin Clean Energy and supporting infrastructure for nonmotorized transportation choices. Naming the Tennessee Valley pathway after McGlashan was unanimously supported by the Marin County Parks and Open Space Commission and affirmed by the Marin County Board of Supervisors in 2013.

“Naming this pathway after Charles is a fitting tribute to his vision,” said Sears, McGlashan’s successor in District 3.

The dedication ceremony commemorated the 12-year collaboration among community members, agencies and individuals who helped create the beautiful community connector that the pathway is today.

The public is invited to a dedication and ribbon-cutting ceremony Friday, June 27, for the Charles F. McGlashan Pathway, named for the former Marin County Supervisor who passionately advocated for nonmotorized transportation options.The paved bike-pedestrian pathway, which has had sections opened to the public gradually since 2012, is in the Tamalpais Valley area of southern Marin County, within the district represented by McGlashan from 2004 until his death in 2011. The pathway runs along the southern bank of Coyote Creek for about half a mile from its intersection with the Mill Valley-Sausalito Multiuse Path to the intersection of Tennessee Valley Road and Marin Avenue.

The ceremony will take place at the Log Cabin at 60 Tennessee Valley Road in Tam Valley at 5:30 p.m. Friday, June 27. Supervisor Kathrin Sears and Tamalpais Community Service District President Jeff Brown will convene the ceremony honoring McGlashan’s work to bring the pathway to fruition.

Initial funding for the pathway was secured by U.S. Rep. Lynn Woolsey and Marin County Supervisor Annette Rose. Later, the pathway became a key part of the Nonmotorized Transportation Pilot Program (NTPP), a federal program begun in 2005 that launched Marin and three other U.S. communities in a nationwide program to reduce car trips by promoting safe bike and walking options. McGlashan once reassured a local resident that the pathway would be built so children could get out of Tam Valley to the Mill Valley-Sausalito Greenway and up to local schools. “It has been a long hard project to get this designed and cleared for permits … and we’re close,” he said at the time.

McGlashan saw the pathway not just as a practical and safe means to get around the community, away from cars and busy roads, but as a way to get people of all ages into nature to enjoy the beauty of Coyote Creek and the scenic views of forested hills. “For Charles, it was about bringing people together,” said Andy Peri of the Marin County Bicycle Coalition.

Before McGlashan died while on vacation in March 2011, he was renowned for boundless energy, passion and the promotion of projects aimed at reducing Marin’s greenhouse gas emissions. His achievements included the formation of Marin Clean Energy and supporting infrastructure for nonmotorized transportation choices. Naming the Tennessee Valley pathway after McGlashan was unanimously supported by the Marin County Parks and Open Space Commission and affirmed by the Marin County Board of Supervisors in 2013.

“Naming this pathway after Charles is a fitting tribute to his vision,” said Sears, McGlashan’s successor in District 3.

The dedication ceremony will commemorate the 12-year collaboration among community members, agencies and individuals who helped create the beautiful community connector that the pathway is today. Invited guests include members of the McGlashan family, former U.S. Rep. Lynn Woolsey, former Supervisor Annette Rose, Assemblymember Marc Levine, and representatives from the Marin County Bicycle Coalition, the Marin County Department of Public Works and Marin County Parks and Open Space.

The Tamalpais Community Services District’s Creekside Friday music and barbecue dinner starts immediately after the ceremony at 6:30 p.m. 

The County of Marin is proposing a new colored placard system for consumers hoping for more clarity on the food safety inspection results of their favorite restaurants – and for restaurants hoping to tout their stellar food safety scores.

The proposed “Go For Green” program, which heads to the Marin County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday, June 3, centers on the placement near a restaurant’s entrance of placards that would mimic a traffic light – green for go (“pass”), yellow for caution ("conditional pass") or red for stop ("closed"). It’s called the.

“With a glance at the placard, the public will be able to determine whether it is clean and safe to dine in,” Rebecca Ng, Deputy Director of the County’s Environmental Health Services (EHS) Division, said in a statement. “The more interest the public shows in restaurant ratings, the more care the restaurants might show in producing a clean environment with safely prepared food.”

Mandated by the California Retail Food Code, EHS permits and inspects retail food facilities throughout Marin County. In addition to routine inspections, EHS staff responds to health and safety complaints as well as reports of food-borne illness associated with a food facility.

Ng said the public has become more interested in food safety with a desire for more information about health conditions at food facilities. Strong ratings tend to increase customer trust and are considered good for business.

Supervisors will hear the proposed ordinance June 3 and again on June 17 if the board agrees to move it forward. If approved, a trial run would begin in July along with “Go For Green” classes for food facility employees. If all goes well, placards would be visible to consumers starting in January 2015.

The proposed “Go For Green” program would supplement the online posting of food facility inspection reports at the County’s food inspection website. Click here to view the food inspection reports for all 129 of the food-serving businesses in the 94941.  

A new mobile website for smartphones allows Marin users to find out about health inspection track records of a restaurant before they scan a menu and place an order. “When you’re out, the mobile app makes it easy to check this information as if you were at home on a PC or laptop,” Ng said.

 Placard systems are already in place in Sacramento and Alameda counties, and Santa Clara County is considering the system along with Marin. Local food facility owners were invited to a March 2014 meeting to hear about the proposal and provide input. Ng said there is solid support for the placard proposal.

The Board of Supervisors is expected to discuss the proposal at around 10 a.m. Tuesday, June 3, in the board's chambers, room 330 at the Marin Civic Center. The meeting will be streamed live and archived here.

What do you think of the proposed placard program?  Would you use it as a consumer? Tell us in the Comments below.

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Nearly three years after Tam Valley residents lost their grocery store, the owners of the 23,000-square-foot space in Tam Junction have inked a deal with Sprouts Farmer Market, a fast-growing, “independent natural foods grocery store chain” based in Arizona.

Citing lease contingencies, a Sprouts spokesperson declined to comment on the details, saying only, “We are thrilled to come to Mill Valley.” The company has yet to identify an opening date in 2014, she said.

The move is likely a welcome relief for Tam Valley residents, who have been without a local grocery store since December 2010, when location Delano’s IGA Market closed its store at 209 Flamingo Road, one of five DeLano's markets in Marin and San Francisco that shut down at that time.

Two years later, as San Jose-based retail chain Orchard Supply Hardware prepared to open a store in the space, a pair of petitions from Tam Valley resident Mark Marinozzi successfully sought to dissuade OSH from doing so and they pulled the plug on their plans. One of those petitions invoked the community’s need for a grocery store in the 23,000-square-foot space at 209 Flamingo Road, while the other urged one prospective grocery tenant to move into Tam Valley. OSH filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy in June.

At that time, Robert Knez, CEO of HL Commercial Real Estate in San Rafael and the agent for the building's owners, the Parrish Trust, noted that while the building had been vacant for two years, Kroger Co., which owns the Cala Foods/Bell Market chain, had subleased the Tam Valley space to DeLano Retail Partners. That firm’s lease on the space did not run out until April 2012, so the Parrish Trust was getting revenue from the vacant building for 16 months after DeLano's closed.

Stay tuned for more info on Sprouts’ plans to open a grocery store in Tam Junction.

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