Downtown San Jose gets a much-needed dose of ‘retail therapy’

It’s no secret that retail shopping has been a weak spot in downtown San Jose for decades. There have been a few success stories that have been exceptions, and one has certainly been the Moment pop-up shops that were installed on the ground floor of the Market Street garage facing San Pedro Square a few years ago.

So it was really encouraging Friday to see the San Jose Downtown Association expand that program with Moment San Pedro, two storefronts on the Paseo de San Antonio between Third and Fourth streets that will be home to five businesses — all owned by women.

“This is a dream come true for us,” said Paloma Serna, a San Jose resident who is running La Paloma Imports with her sister, Cecy Serna. They’re sharing space with two others, Cositas Contreras and MiGi Cera Candles, in the Sueñas storefront at 112 Paseo de San Antonio. Across the way, Plant Slut and Bad Witch Crystals split a storefront at 115 Paseo de San Antonio.

All the business owners expressed their optimism for downtown at a ribbon-cutting event held Friday with Mayor Matt Mahan, San Jose Downtown Association CEO Alex Stettinksi and other city officials.

Marcelina Castro started making candles at home in 2018 and opened an online store about two years later. She started collaborating with San Jose Made, a collective of small businesses and vendors in 2022, leading to her being part of Moment Paseo.

“It’s an incredible opportunity. If I knew that I was going to be here in 2024, I would never have believed it,” she said, adding that making candles and running candlemaking workshops allowed her to explore her creative side while also helping customers get some self-care. “We hope to give you guys a great place to gather together and enjoy your retail therapy.”

San Jose City Councilmember Omar Torres said the city should always make sure small businesses have the opportunity and resources to open up a brick-and-mortar location downtown. “I’ve always told our small businesses that their dream should be our dream,” Torres said.

And that dream will be expanding even more, as Stettinski said that plans are in the works for a third Moment pop-up storefront location on Post Street.

FOUR DECADES OF LEADERSHIP: The YWCA Golden Gate Silicon Valley celebrated its 40th Tribute to Women Awards on Thursday night, with more than 500 guests packing the ballroom at the Santa Clara Marriott.

Thirty-five women were honored at the event for their work mentoring young professionals, promoting mental health and wellness, advancing racial justice and DEI initiatives or for being emerging leaders. The impressive cohort are leaders at valley companies and organizations like Cisco, Nvidia, Synopsys, IBM, Kaiser Permanente, Oracle, Applied Materials, San Jose State University, Stanford University and Lockheed Martin Space.

But four women were presented with special lifetime achievement awards, representing the event’s four decades. They were Blach Construction Vice President Laura Bold, longtime IBM executive Laura Guio, Cisco Executive Vice President Francine Katsoudas, and Denise Aquilante Johnson, who recently retired as executive director of care coordination in Northern California for Kaiser Permanente.

SHOW AND TELL: The Los Gatos Foundation for Older Adults to Thrive has a perfect event every month for more mature movie fans. Paul Gunsky, owner of the Cinelux theater chain, is opening the doors of the Los Gatos Theatre to the group for a “Monthly Monday Morning Movie” on the first Monday of most months. This month — that’s May 6 — they’ll be watching Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt in “The Fall Guy” at 10 a.m.

Lissa Kreisler will chat with Gunsky onstage before the movie starts to talk about the history of the classic theatre on North Santa Cruz Avenue, and that alone is worth the $10 admission price. Go to www.losgatostheatre.com for tickets or purchase them at the box office, and keep an eye out for future events for vibrant older adults in Los Gatos at losgatosthrives.org.

HONOR ROLE: Bay Area theater fans who were following the Tony Award nominations might have recognized one of this year’s nominees: Will Brill, who picked up a bid for Best Featured Actor in a Play for his role as bass player Reg in “Stereophonic.” David Adjmi’s play about the dysfunctional goings-on at a Sausalito recording studio in the mid-1970s picked up a record 13 nominations, the most ever for a play.

But rewind a couple of decades and Brill, a Menlo Park native who went to Gunn High School in Palo Alto, could be seen on stage with Children’s Musical Theater of San Jose, where he appeared in several productions. Fellow CMTSJ alum and former executive director Michael Mulcahy recalls he had great character roles, including as Clem Rogers in “The Will Rogers Follies” and Caiaphas in “Jesus Christ Superstar.”

TAKING A SWING: There’s still time to sign up for “Putting for Parks,” an inaugural golf event on May 10 at Los Lagos Golf Course in San Jose that will benefit the San Jose Parks Foundation. It’s $125 per golfer — that includes greens fees, a cart, raffle tickets and lunch — and there’ll be contests for longest drive, straightest drive and “closest to the cooler.” To register, go to eventbrite.com and search for “Putting for Parks.”