A Guide to the Best of Southern California : SHOPTALK : From the Mountains to the Sea

‘ROBERTO’S FAMILY in Colombia would send gifts, and friends saw them displayed in the house and loved them,” says Vance Grosser, who with partner Roberto Concha took a chance when they opened their shop, Foresta. “We felt that the art was different enough from other ethnic arts, and Colombia is such a large country--it touches the Caribbean, the Amazon, the mountains--that it has a large area from which to draw crafts.”

Foresta is located in downtown Long Beach, currently in the midst of a redevelopment boom--the new World Trade Center and Landmark Square are right up the street, and the Metro Rail Blue Line one block away. Specializing in arts and handicrafts from South America, its diversity of colorful, high-quality wares ranges from sophisticated leather goods (including a wonderful shoulder bag that expands to a carry-on flight bag) and chic straw hats to primitive werregue canasto , vegetable fiber baskets from the Pacific and Amazon regions of Colombia that are so tightly woven they can hold liquids. Other Colombian offerings include brightly painted clay bells in the shapes of peasant women, friars and birds; hammered copper bowls and pots, and fringed cotton scarves that can double as soft, wrapped belts.

From Venezuela comes a crop of fertility masks made by the Guajaribo tribe in the Orinoco River delta; from Peru, alpaca tapestries in muted earth tones.

Arriving in time for the year-end holidays will be a selection of nativities, Ecuadoran shoulder bags, ceramic jewelry and vibrantly colored primitive oil paintings.

Foresta, 107 W. Broadway, Long Beach; (213) 432-5220.