Zobha Closes Downtown Shop – San Francisco Retailer Terrestra to Move In

Zobha, the Mill Valley-based high-end fitness and yoga apparel company that opened its first retail shop in downtown Mill Valley last October, closed the store earlier this month after the company was bought and moved to the East Coast.

Jamie Hanna, the Mill Valley resident who founded the company in 2008 and has served as its CEO as it has made its products available in 425 retail locations, including some Neiman Marcus stores, in 27 countries, could not be reached for comment on the closure.

Zobha, whose apparel is comparable to Lululemon, was acquired in 2011 by Kellwood Co., a St. Louis, Missour-based portfolio company of private investment firm Sun Capital Partners Inc. But earlier this year, the company began looking for buyers for Zobha, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Zobha was sold to an “undisclosed third party,” Kellwood CEO Jill Granoff told the St. Louis Business Journal late last month.

Kristi Denton Cohen, who owns the space at 30 Miller Ave., confirmed the shutdown, saying that Hanna notified her at the end of June.

“It happened really fast,” Denton Cohen said of the shutdown. “I was sad to see them go – I really liked them – they were great people.”

The space has been one clothing store after another since Tamalpais Hardware closed in 1986, from Ken Brooks’ Staccato to Red Dot to Showroom to Outback in the Temple of Venus to Zobha.

That focus will shift with Denton Cohen's latest tenant for the 2,000-square-foot space, as Terrestra, a “museum store without the museum” that sells a variety of home accessories, leather goods, jewelry and glass, ceramic and wood decorative objects.

Terrestra was launched in 2003 by San Francisco husband-and-wife duo Ray Kristof and Amy Satran. Trained in educational publishing and design, respectively, the couple met at Apple in the 1980s and in 1992 founded the design firm Ignition.

They opened Terrestra in Berkeley’s Walnut Square before moving it to San Francisco's Laurel Village neighborhood. Kristof said the couple had been searching for a second location.

"None provided Mill Valley's balance of a vibrant local community with equal draw as a destination, easy access from all over the Bay Area, plus a strong appreciation for the community value of small businesses," he said.

Satran said the couple fell in love with the spacious light-filled space at 30 Miller immediately. They plan to open Terrestra in Mill Valley in mid-September.

“We feel so privileged to have found a space that’s so perfect for Terrestra,” she said. “We can’t wait to open and start learning about the needs and preferences of the community — that’s the most important part of creating a truly valuable resource."

"We work hard to seek out unusual products they might not see everywhere, and we love to bring the wonderful work of these artists and designers to a new audience," she added.