Liora Soladay had every intention of returning to her native Cape Town after her backpacking trip in India and Nepal. It was 1993. She had never heard of the Grateful Dead or of West Marin—two forces that would come to shape her life.
But in a New Delhi vegetarian restaurant on her 24th birthday, she bumped into Jay Soladay, a San Anselmo kid on the fringes of the Dead’s circle who had hung out backstage at their shows as a teen. He had a bushy beard, long hair and a Grateful Dead baseball cap perched on his head.
“He was funny, talkative, engaging, and he told great stories,” Ms. Soladay said. “He was the opposite of shy.”
Thirty-three years later, they’re married and have two grown daughters and a thriving Point Reyes Station business that caters to Dead Heads and their ilk. It’s called Jayli, a portmanteau of obvious origin.
Their unobtrusive 3,000-square-foot retail and warehouse space is just off Highway 1, tucked behind Café Reyes on one side and Coyuchi on the other. There they sell an array of custom-made hippie clothing.
The company’s tagline is borrowed from the lyric of a Dead song: “Are you kind?”
“For us, kindness matters in all aspects of life, whether it’s interpersonal or whether it’s being kind to the Earth,” Ms. Soladay said. “Showing kindness and empathy to others is just a big part of who we are, what we believe in and what Jayli is all about.”
In an age of fast fashion, Ms. Soladay prides herself on producing clothes that last. Jayli’s designs are stitched by members of a women’s cooperative and produced with Nepalese and Thai partners she’s worked with for decades.
“This is handmade slow fashion that’s made with love and care and is going to last you for years and years,” she said.
Liora considers herself the boss of the operation, though Jay vehemently disagrees. “We’re equal partners,” he said. “Everything’s 50-50.”
But Christina Nelson, their right-hand and left-hand woman, shares Liora’s take.
Back in the day, Ms. Nelson said, the Grateful Dead had a San Rafael office with a sign that said: “Do you want to talk to the man in charge or the woman who knows what’s going on?”
“She’s the woman who knows what’s going on,” said Ms. Nelson, who has worked at Jayli for many years. She helps with the designs and can finish Liora’s sentences. “He’s wheeling around, dancing, and she’s pulling up her britches,” she added.
Jay is an ideas and logistics guy; Liora’s a designer, an organizer, a bookkeeper, a social media maven and more. He gets inspirations. She keeps things on track.
About a third of their clothing is adorned with Grateful Dead logos, the rest with peace signs, flowers and other groovy ’60s motifs. It’s the consummate collection for the tie-die-loving flower child: bell bottoms, peasant blouses, mini-skirts and midi-skirts in swirling paisley prints.
Liora, whose life story is captured in a series of tattoos adorning her arms, is trim and fit at 57 and sometimes models her clothing in the Jayli catalogue, alongside various young West Marin women, some of whom are recruited on main street.
Jayli began as a renegade business operating from the parking lot at Dead shows—impromptu psychedelic flea markets known as Shakedown Streets, after one of the band’s signature songs. These unsanctioned events were often raided by police, with sellers quickly packing up their goods when the cops came and setting their wares out again as soon as officers left.
When they met in India, unbeknownst to Liora, Jay was scouting out clothing and tchotchkes to sell at Shakedowns. After months traveling with a group of backpackers they fell in with on the road, Jay headed off to Bali and Liora went to Sydney.
But parting was such sweet sorrow, and Jay called her in Australia and invited her to move to Marin. She said yes, and she soon showed up with a backpack and $400.
Jay was working construction at the time, and Liora got a couple of waitressing jobs in San Rafael. They did the clothing business on the side, taking occasional trips to Asia to source outfits that would appeal to the weed-smoking, ’shroom-imbibing, love-happy Shakedown crowd.
Their first big taste of glory came in 1994 at a Dead show in Eugene, Ore., where they landed their first wholesale customer. “We couldn’t believe how our pockets were just full of money, and how quickly everything was selling,” Jay recalled. “Everyone loved everything, and it was just insane.”
Not long after that, they quit their day jobs and registered Jayli as a formal business. They began attending trade shows around the country. At one, representatives of Rhino records, which manages the Dead’s business interests, asked them to become a licensed dealer. From then on, while the bootleggers on Shakedown Street had to flee the cops, Jayli could just keep selling.
At the beginning, they operated out of a bedroom in a Lagunitas rental. Then they moved to a bigger house in Point Reyes Station—coincidentally, the same blue house now rented by Maddy Sobel, the jam lady who has been to more than 400 Dead shows and considers Jayli her favorite store. From there, they moved to a bigger space at the Creamery Building before landing in their current location.
Maddy, who is rarely seen around town without a backpack designed by Jayli, used to babysit the Soladays’ daughters, and they’ve grown close.
“They’re the sweetest couple, the kindest people,” Ms. Sobel said. “I dance with them whenever humanly possible. Their store is a social hub. They always welcome locals in to hang out. When you’re there, it feels like family.”
The business reached its apogee in May 2024, when Dead and Company, one of various post-Jerry Garcia incarnations of the band, took up residence at the Sphere in Las Vegas for 30 shows over 10 weekends.
With no parking lot available, temperatures in the 100s and a thicket of Vegas regulations to negotiate, an outdoor Shakedown would not be possible. Then Jay pitched an idea: an indoor Shakedown just down the road at the Tuscany Suites and Casino.
He remembered the place from a prior trade show. They teamed up with Sunshine Powers of Love on Haight, a San Francisco purveyor of all things Dead and tie-dyed, to pull it together.
The casino location, more than a half-mile down the road, was a gamble. Would anyone show up?
They did, in droves. Tens of thousands of them, weekend after weekend. The event was such a happening that it received a lengthy write-up in the New York Times.
Liora and Jay are now planning a Vegas Shakedown for Phish, a jam band that enjoys a lot of fan crossover with the Dead. It starts in two weeks, and everything is ready to go, despite a shipment delayed in the Middle East due to the Iran War.
Indeed, running Jayli has been a long, strange trip—and it’s one that Liora thoroughly enjoys.
“I get to travel and be a part of different cultures,” she said. “I’ve brought my kids all over the world with me. We have people who are like family in Nepal. We’ve grown up together, had wins and losses together. I never thought of myself as creative, but through this business, I’ve come to realize I’m an artist. There were plenty of flops, especially early on, but I’m good at it most of the time.”