Best Neighborhood Clothing Shop
Lower Hater
True, the youthful gallery/clothing store Upper Playground is a block away and they, too, love to represent their vibrant Lower Haight digs with a selection of street art and fashion wares that celebrate the area's natural and artificial funkiness. The newer boutique Lower Hater has a similarly rooted aesthetic in DJ/music culture, but it goes just one step beyond by emblazoning their fierce hood pride right on the storefront with a puntastic name. Original items like Lower Hater sticker packs and "4-1-5 Contact High" T-shirts (the latter a brilliant spoof of the '80s PBS television show 3-2-1 Contact) are perfect, hyper-localized finds for travelers who don't want to do the typical touristy thing, even in their mementos of a journey.