Golden Mean Cafe
Golden Mean Cafe
With its gold-painted ceiling, mellow music and warm atmosphere, GOLDEN MEAN CAFE is a new hub where food lovers can
unite, enjoy organic vegan fare and lounge afterwards in a quaint upstairs bookstore. This community-oriented café guarantees friendly service and mostly likely a personal welcome from the owner, Aaron Glassman. The menu is full of choices that satisfy any palette. Their “When in Rome” salad is graced with sweetpotato cornbread croutons and lightly flavored with creamy hemp Caesar (vegan) dressing, neither of which should be missed. If you like veggie burgers, Golden Mean has a treat for you. The menu includes completely vegan sandwiches, soup and salads, wraps and pizza. Golden Mean offers agave-sweetened vegan milkshakes made with coconut milk ice cream. Those of us with a sweet tooth can enjoy daily assorted pastries paired with organic teas or coffee. Golden Mean provides healthy food options to help balance your diet and perpetuate “divine proportion,” says Aaron. Enjoy vegan comfort food, and relax or study in the upstairs lounge decorated with beautiful floor pillows and furniture from Bali. There’s also free internet access, and Golden Mean hosts regular community events. Join Aaron every Sunday evening for a channeling session.
Golden Mean Cafe, 1028 Wilshire Bl. Santa Monica, CA 90401. goldenmeancafe.com
Community Acupuncture
Urban Remedy
URBAN REMEDY is your first stop for community acupuncture healing. Once you enter this cozy space ringed with reclining chairs, it’s easy to forget you’re at a healthcare provider’s office because it’s designed to harmonize you with the elements of nature. Now serving the Westside and beyond, the medical center treats everyday health concerns including insomnia, chronic pain, addiction and infertility. At Urban Remedy, patients can benefit from a community-based healing atmosphere. “Much like the synergy of a good Yoga class, community acupuncture treatments leave you feeling connected, rejuvenated, inspired and deeply supported,” says Urban Remedy director and founder, Eric Baumgartner. “A collective healing energy is created, enhancing the effects of each treatment and producing results that would otherwise seem miraculous.” Private consultations and treatments are also available. Urban Remedy hopes to create a model for global access to natural medicine and wellness care. Community treatments are based on a sliding scale of $25 to $50.
LYfe Yoga Gets Grounded
LYfe Yoga Center
On another step on his journey from New York businessman to California Yoga teacher, Michael Ruccolo found a home for his dream Yoga studio. After two moves in one year, third time is definitely the charm for LYFE YOGA CENTER. Nestled in an ele-
vated eco-friendly space, LYfe Yoga Center can finally get grounded in its beautiful Hermosa Beach location. An ocean view and miraculous sunsets are nature’s gifts that shine through the glass house Yoga oasis. The studio celebrates the Y campaign motto to “let yourself find enlightenment.” “We focus on all the different forms of Yoga [to] really find what fits your body at that time,” says Michael, the studio owner. From gentle flow to more vigorous practices, there is the opportunity to find a class made for you. LYfe Yoga also gives back to the community through philanthropy. Whether they’re sponsoring the United Nations Walk the World event or donating Yoga classes to women from a local crisis center, the studio is always looking for new ways to create and maintain responsibilities to the world around us with the Yoga philosophy in mind. “Yoga is about a relationship with self and others through which we can develop a refined state of awareness,” says Michael. “This ability becomes the greatest experience for all of the humanity but can only be supported by an ethical responsibility to act with austerity.”
LYfe Yoga Center, 1310 Pacific Coast Highway, Hermosa Beach, CA 90254. lyfeyogacenter.com
Rose-Colored Temple
Radha Govindas Temple
RADHA GOVINDAS TEMPLE has reestablished its roots in Venice. The temple will include both the traditional Hare Krishna approach as well as a center of performing arts, showcasing local and international talents in devotional arts, says Nischinta Dasa, the cultural, religious and legal director of the temple. The Hare Krishna temple will become a new venue for plays, lectures, ancient ceremonies like the fire sacrifice, dance and Ayurvedic teaching. The temple lounge is now open to the public for classes and lectures including harikatha (stories of the deities), kirtan, bhajan (sacred song) and Vedic instruction. “I hope the temple will move forward to be a vital center for Yoga by serving the needs of the community in terms of food [and] being a nice atmosphere for Yoga, meditation and kirtan,” says newly-appointed temple President Bhaktivedanta Padmanabha Maharaja. Radha Govindas’s Indian vegetarian restaurant is coming soon.
Radha Govindas Temple, 305 Rose Ave. Venice, CA 90291. rosetemple.org
New Yoga Center in Malibu
The Veronica Studio
In the center of Malibu with an expansive ocean view, THE VERONICA STUDIO graces its residence with a beautiful new studio specializing in Yoga and Tai Chi also offering Qigong. Veronica’s offers private sessions and intimate and customized classes for up to ten people. Subdue your stress levels with Tai Chi classes overlooking the ocean while feeling the salty breeze sweep across your face. These classes are taught by worldrenowned Tai Chi Chuan instructor Doria Cook-Nelson. “If you don’t treat the inside [by] meditating in Yoga and Tai Chi, your skin on the outside wouldn’t look well,” says Veronica Barton-Schwartz, the owner and operator of Veronica Skin and Body Care Center. The new studio is a likely addition to Veronica Skin and Body Care Center, which has been serving high- and low-profile Malibu clientele for thirty years with their day spa and medical spa for ten years. The wellness center caters to the body’s needs inside and out with skin and medical care and now, spiritually through meditative practice, says Veronica. The eco-friendly studio is dressed with cushioned bamboo flooring and environmentally-friendly paint.
The Veronica Studio, 24955 Pacific Coast Hwy Ste B101, Malibu, CA 90265. (310) 456 – 8883; Veronicaskincare.com
Green Yoga Studio on Third Street Promenade
Tamal Dodge, YogaCo
While twenty-four may seem a young age to open a studio, Tamal Dodge has been doing Yoga and living the yogic lifestyle nearly
his entire life, influenced by his family. His dream to open a Yoga center is coming true with the help of business partners Kelsey and Grant. Welcome YOGACO, which stands for “collective, community, consciousness;” it’s the newest green studio in Santa Monica on the Third Street Promenade. “I wanted to open a place where people can flourish physically, mentally and spiritually,” says studio owner Tamal. “This studio is a labor of love for the community,” he says. The 6000-square feet of eco-friendly space features two Yoga rooms, two stores, three lounges, two bathrooms, teachers lounges, lobby and courtyard. YogaCo preserves Mother Nature by using bamboo floors, waterless urinals, bicycle racks and lowenergy lighting. “We are unique in the sense that we are a donation-based studio that offers a wide variety of classes with an eclectic staff of teachers from all over the LA area in one of the largest studios to open on the Westside,” says Tamal. From Anusara and Iyengar to Yin Yoga and meditation, YogaCo has a class for any yogi. The studio officially opens its doors August 1.
YogaCo, 1404 3rd St. Santa Monica, CA 90405. yogaco.com
All New Doors by Melissa Chua. Melissa is a regular contributor to LA YOGA who is a graduate of CSU-Northridge’s Journalism program. She recently saw a monkey on her final day in Costa Rica and is passionate about storytelling, getting punctuation right and fiery Power Yoga classes. M.chua13@gmail.com.
By Melissa Chua
