Pedicures

Walt Disney World recently revamped the spa at the Grand Floridian Resort & Spa at Lake Buena Vista , Fla., and plans to do the same at a second Florida property next year. It's all part of a "reimagined" spa concept, in Disney speak, called Senses . Starting Jan. 16, Walt Disney World will take over operation of all spas, salons and fitness centers at its properties, a company statement says. The pampering at Senses is aimed at parents, not children, though guests will hear what's called "Disney orchestral music" playing while having a treatment.

Walt Disney World recently revamped the spa at the Grand Floridian Resort & Spa at Lake Buena Vista , Fla., and plans to do the same at a second Florida property next year. It's all part of a "reimagined" spa concept, in Disney speak, called Senses . Starting Jan. 16, Walt Disney World will take over operation of all spas, salons and fitness centers at its properties, a company statement says. The pampering at Senses is aimed at parents, not children, though guests will hear what's called "Disney orchestral music" playing while having a treatment.

Does sandal season make you feel like sticking your toes in the sand? Pedicures can smooth calluses, remove dry, flaky skin and give your toenails polish. If you want a fresh look, you might try this season's palette of fruity polish colors, including some electric pastel greens and blues. "We have a lot of new colors . . . things that are kind of whimsical, like Key Lime Pie, for example," says Rhonda Stefanick, pedicurist at the Noelle Spa for Beauty & Wellness in Stamford, Conn.

I was thinking the other day, while I was getting my toes done, that I need to get out of Los Angeles before it's too late, before I start frequenting spas or doing picnics at the Bowl on a regular basis. In about five years, L.A. is destined to become the first unisex city in America. As it is, they've got poor Joe Torre doing ads for green tea. And I want no part of that. A real nation has two political parties and two distinct sexes, Sacha Baron Cohen not withstanding. "Isn't this fun, Daddy?"

PRUNING trees and shrubs to form hedges is as old as gardening. In the great estates of the past, hedges framed views, defined borders and marked transitions to wilderness. In modern Los Angeles, an average lot is a sixth of an acre. A hedge allows homeowners to soften the transition to the street or blot out an eyesore, be it an alley, a McMansion, a crack house, a neighbor's kitchen window, a jalopy or junkyard dog. Increasingly, hedges no longer frame views. They are the view.

With his attorney charging that he is a victim of "irrational fear and misinformation" reminiscent of the Dark Ages, an AIDS patient who was denied a pedicure took the owner of a trendy nail salon to court on Monday in the first civil test of West Hollywood's AIDS anti-discrimination law. Paul Jasperson, 36, contends that Jessica's Nail Clinic on Sunset Boulevard violated his civil rights when it turned him down for a pedicure in July, 1986.

Mom deserves special treatment every day, but spas all over Southern California are making it easy to spoil her on Mother's Day, offering special deals on massages, treatments, relaxations, classes and products. And it's not just for her; since Mom loves you, she's going to want you to benefit from all this discount feel-good too. Ole Henriksen Face & Body Salon During the month of May, the acclaimed spa offers the Like Mother Like Daughter treatment (30-minute lavender hydrotherapy soak by candlelight, customized facial, one cleanser and one eye cream specifically suggested by your esthetician, $250)

ON A recent afternoon, Hyatae Williams was getting her nails painted a sparkly shade of tangerine, while her sister, Ionisia, was having light-blue eye shadow brushed on her lids. The Williams sisters, swaddled in pink terry cloth robes, looked relaxed after a morning of pampering at Spa Di Da in West Hollywood. It was the kind of scene that unfolds in countless Los Angeles spas every day, except for one major difference: Hyatae is 11 years old and Ionisia is 10.

Sheila Cook settles back in the stuffed leather chair and wiggles her toes in the attached whirlpool basin, bubbling with warm water. As a bank manager who regularly logs a 12-hour day, much of it on her feet, her biweekly spa pedicure is part luxury, part necessity. "If I don't get my pedicure, I am cranky," said Cook, 52, of Shadow Hills.

With the boom of manicure-pedicure salons everywhere, the California Podiatric Medical Assn. was concerned enough to survey its members about their patients and pedicures. To its surprise, the group found out that pedicures may actually lead to doctor visits. True--and for two primary reasons. In the recent survey, about 25% of podiatrists reported that among patients coming in with problems stemming from commercial pedicures, 70% of those are from dirty equipment.

Ready for the latest in spa pampering? Prepare to dunk your tootsies in a tank of water and let tiny carp nibble away. Fish pedicures are creating something of a splash in the D.C. area, where a northern Virginia spa has been offering them for the last four months. John Ho, who runs the Yvonne Hair & Nails salon with his wife, Yvonne Le, said 5,000 people had taken the plunge. He said he wanted to come up with something unique and needed a replacement for razors used to scrape off dead skin.

In Chino Hills, preschool director Susan Harris was tending to a student who had stepped on a bee when the ground began to tremble. As they huddled together under a counter, the little girl could only stare into her eyes. "It's OK," Harris told her, though that was not clear at all. "It's OK." Across town, Kimberly Kessel was putting away a vacuum cleaner when her house started shaking. She bolted into the backyard without her shoes, her blue-eyed, 18-month-old son cradled in her arms.

The facialist at a popular salon here couldn't help being a bit nervous. Her client that afternoon was a particularly demanding one, certain to quiz her unrelentingly about the latest anti-wrinkle creams and pore-reduction potions. But such exactitude, she said, is typical of her male customers. Pakistan may be a macho, tradition-bound society with conservative Muslim mores, but the male-beauty trade is booming here.

Even the well-heeled are willing to cut back in a rocky economy, though there are some sacrifices they just won't make. Laurel Chirico, who owns three Tony & Guy Hairdressing salons in Orange County and charges $250 for a cut, can testify to that. "I'm booked out a couple months. I don't see any slowdown at all," Chirico said recently. "We're definitely a business that's pretty safe" in the midst of what might be a recession.

IT'S billed as the "After Shopping Paradise," a "self-indulgence" that combines foot reflexology and "a truly spectacular pedicure to revive your feet and your spirits." What is it really? A $200 pedicure. It takes place at La Prairie Spa at the Beverly Hills Hotel. You slip into a terry robe and slippers and sip a cup of Introspection tea, then an attendant leads you into a candle-lighted massage room. Once you've disrobed (for a foot treatment?

In Southern California, the land of nearly year-round sandal weather, pedicures long ago advanced from basic corner nail salon services to spa treatments featuring reclining chairs and peppermint massage oils. Now pedicures have ascended to the realm of luxury and a few of their practitioners to the level of celebrity.

A Los Angeles County Superior Court judge ruled Thursday that a West Hollywood nail salon does not have to provide a pedicure to an AIDS patient who claimed that the salon discriminated against him because of his disease. In his 12-page decision, Judge David M. Rothman turned down Paul Jasperson's request for a court order that would have compelled Jessica's Nail Clinic to provide him with pedicure services.

I was thinking the other day, while I was getting my toes done, that I need to get out of Los Angeles before it's too late, before I start frequenting spas or doing picnics at the Bowl on a regular basis. In about five years, L.A. is destined to become the first unisex city in America. As it is, they've got poor Joe Torre doing ads for green tea. And I want no part of that. A real nation has two political parties and two distinct sexes, Sacha Baron Cohen not withstanding. "Isn't this fun, Daddy?"

Sheila Cook settles back in the stuffed leather chair and wiggles her toes in the attached whirlpool basin, bubbling with warm water. As a bank manager who regularly logs a 12-hour day, much of it on her feet, her biweekly spa pedicure is part luxury, part necessity. "If I don't get my pedicure, I am cranky," said Cook, 52, of Shadow Hills.

Call it the five-starring of children. Or just kids puttin' on the ritz -- as in Ritz-Carlton. At some top hotels, a 5-year-old can get a facial, an 8-year-old can be tutored in golf etiquette, teens can take in some skeet shooting and, soon, a "ski nanny" can whisk little downhillers to and from the slopes in Colorado. The choices for young guests at luxury hotels, in the $300-and-up class of room rates, are mind-boggling.