• Chanel and upscale jeweler Van Cleef & Arpels have both snatched up new retail store locations downtown. Chanel has apparently finalized one of the most significant commercial real estate deals in San Francisco since the pandemic began, purchasing the four-story structure at 340 Post Street for over $63M; the above-mentioned jeweler will take over the former AllSaints location at 140 Geary Street and is expected to open up a retail store sometime this spring. [Hoodline]
  • Santa Clara's Elk Lodge erupted in a plume of fire and smoke Friday. The two-alarm fire caused more than 300 people to evacuate the immediate area, many of those evacuees coming from adjacent buildings; it's unclear how the blaze exactly started, but Santa Clara fire battalion chief Drew Miller has said that the fire might have started in the kitchen; two people who were inside the building when the inferno began suffered minor burns. [NBC Bay Area]
  • So, apparently, the Bay Area is becoming synonymous with a "megaregion" as lines between counties blur and merge — a slurry only made less definite with more people continuing to move to outlying metropolitans. [ABC7]
  • Those who were initially given a J&J vaccine, and were subsequently boosted with another supplemental dose of either the same inoculation or of an mRNA vaccine, can now request a third shot in San Francisco; the City is advising a Pfizer shot for the third. [Chronicle]
  • Don't forget that the Chinese New Year mini-procession will take place in SF's Chinatown from 10:30 a.m. to 11:00 a.m. today; expect giant walking puppets, costumed stilt walkers, fan dancers, and more. [Mission Local]
  • A newly established marine protected area (MPA) in Cuba will safeguard some of the planet's most at-risk marine species, like the hawksbill sea turtle and West Indian manatee. [Mongabay]
  • Oh: Johni Mitchell has joined Neil Young in requesting to have her music removed from Spotify, citing similar reasons to Young that the streaming platform has been too lenient on allowing misinformation around Covid-19 to proliferate its podcast products. [Associated Press]

Photo: Getty Images/chinaface