In the daytime, MintPress hides under Sather Lane, its doors locked and windows shuttered. But at 6:30 p.m., the store awakens: Energetic music pours out and the space lights up with color.<\/p>\n
Inside, MintPress is filled with oil paintings, handcrafted figurines, digital poster art, stickers, 3D printed sculptures and more. The art studio and gift shop officially opened to the public on Valentine\u2019s Day, replacing Art Underground Tattoo Studio, which previously occupied the space.<\/p>\n
The store\u2019s origins, however, trace all the way back to co-owners Christiene Lim and Kayvon Haraz\u2019s lifelong love for creation.<\/p>\n
Lim brings a background in art history, while Haraz\u2019s is in graphic design and motion animation. Both share a passion for learning and diversifying their art techniques.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe decided we needed to create a space to put out our art and share our love of art with other people,\u201d Lim said. \u201cAnd (we needed) a space for other community members, students and organizations to come in and do art and have their art put out.\u201d<\/p>\n
From there, MintPress was born. Primarily an art studio, it offers a variety of services, including animation, illustration and even a laser cutter.<\/p>\n
Lim and Haraz also sell their own pieces, ranging from landscape paintings and lego figurines to custom crystal sculptures. According to Haraz, the store\u2019s combination of both traditional and technologically-driven art comes from their backgrounds in technology and public health.<\/p>\n
Sarah Anzures, a customer who went to MintPress on opening day with her family, said she was referred to the store by a friend. Azures noted being struck by the store\u2019s \u201cvery colorful, very artsy\u201d aesthetic.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe products that were displayed were very unique to my eyes,\u201d Anzures said. \u201c(My son) also likes the store \u2026 With kids, they look at the store and it\u2019s colorful and looks creative, and they are enticed to that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Anzures said she will definitely be back to MintPress. She is especially interested in customizing a Lego figurine that looks like her son with the store\u2019s services.<\/p>\n
Lim and Haraz plan also to host community events and art workshops in the space, including a \u201cPaint & Create\u201d night March 11 and a jazz show featuring local bands March 28.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are interested in growing this place into kind of an incubator of sorts for artists and art-adjacent people in the technology world,\u201d Haraz said. \u201cWe want to keep creating the work that we have and make it as unique as possible. We just hope that other people enjoy it as much as we do.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In the daytime, MintPress hides under Sather Lane, its doors locked and windows shuttered. But at 6:30 p.m.,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":194898,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[91055,91053,91054,91051,143,145,144,91056,91052],"class_list":{"0":"post-194897","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-oakland","8":"tag-art-underground-tattoo-studio","9":"tag-christiene-lim","10":"tag-kayvon-haraz","11":"tag-mintpress","12":"tag-oakland","13":"tag-oakland-headlines","14":"tag-oakland-news","15":"tag-sarah-anzures","16":"tag-sather-lane"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/194897","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=194897"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/194897\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/194898"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=194897"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=194897"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=194897"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}