by Patrick Heig - 324 Reviews - 95 List
Almost everybody's feeling the squeeze from the recession, but that doesn't mean you have to cut back on premium luxuries like fine dining, hair salons, spa treatments... and dental work. Save money while helping a student perfect the craft, or simply indulge in what are sure to be lavish extravagances during this brutal downturn: clean teeth and a decent haircut.
Updated: February 24, 2010
During the week, students from the California Culinary Academy cook fancy seasonal French cuisine lunches and dinners--with linen napkins!---for about ten bucks. Twice a month they even offer a three-and-a-half course lunch for $3.50; if you don't like it you can ask for your bus fare back.
Stylists fresh out of beauty school and salon veterans both come here to train in Sassoon's famed academy, and if you show up for a "model call" (Thursday at 6pm), you can book an appointment for a luxurious shampoo, salon-grade cut and blow dry, all for $18.
This family-owned Hayes Valley cosmetology school offers $15 cuts, $40 facials, $10 manis, $20 pedis and even $17 waxing by stylists-in-training in a retro spot that's changed little in the last two decades.
Students learning Eastern medicine techniques like herbal therapy, shiatsu massage and--whoa--acupuncture, practice on brave patients at this Potrero Hill clinic. Normally pricey acupuncture treatments run $40-60 (based on a sliding scale, and students (with ID) only pay $27.
Senior students in the dentistry program here (accompanied by their professors) provide affordable care for locals' pearly whites. Call to book an appointment, and you'll get an exam for only $28 (make sure to bring your x-rays from your previous dentist, or it'll cost another $79), and if your teeth need attention, the procedure here will cost you hundreds less than you'd pay elsewhere.
