Astaroth Books is an online second-hand bookstore based in Melbourne, and for the foreseeable future we have no plans to open a physical shop.
We rather like being online. It means we can keep working our way through the thousands of strange, obscure and unexpected books waiting to be catalogued without having to work out how on earth we would fit them all into a shopfront.
But we also understand that sometimes online shopping simply isn’t what you want.
Sometimes you want to go into an actual shop. Have a look around, flick through the books, spend far too long choosing a tarot deck and probably leave with something you had absolutely no intention of buying.
So this is a guide to some of the physical witchcraft, occult and esoteric shops you can actually visit in Melbourne and around Victoria.
There is another reason we’re putting it together.
Running a small independent shop isn’t easy. Commercial rents are through the roof, costs keep climbing, and many of the strange little specialist shops we love operate on pretty tight margins at the best of times. Places like these don’t survive simply because people like the idea of them being there. They survive because people actually shop there.
So if you’re heading out to buy a tarot deck, some candles, herbs, ritual supplies or a new book, spend your money with a local independent shop when you can. You might pay a couple of dollars more than you would ordering it from Amazon or another giant retailer, but you’re helping keep an actual shop open.
And frankly, Victoria would be a considerably less interesting place if every strange little independent shop disappeared and we bought everything from the same handful of enormous companies.
Fortunately, Victoria still has a good collection of witchcraft, occult and esoteric shops, from tiny independents to Melbourne institutions that have been around for decades.
This isn’t a ranking and we’re not attempting to catalogue every vaguely metaphysical business in Victoria. These are simply some good places to start.
If books are what brought you here, you can also browse our Witchcraft, Magic & Occult books, or keep reading for places you can visit in person.
Temple of the Divine, Windsor
Temple of the Divine is on Chapel Street in Windsor.
There’s a strong emphasis on spiritual practice and ritual here, with handcrafted ritual tools and items for cleansing, intuition and other spiritual work.
It’s a small independent shop and a good alternative to some of the much bigger and better-known names around Melbourne.
Magick of Artemis, Port Melbourne
Magick of Artemis is a dedicated witchcraft and occult shop in Port Melbourne.
There are ritual and spellcraft supplies, tarot and oracle decks, books and plenty of tools for magical practice. It leans much more heavily into witchcraft than the average metaphysical shop, which is probably what you’re looking for if you’ve found your way onto this page.
Kerry Kulkens Magic Shop, Belgrave
Kerry Kulkens Magic Shop has some serious history behind it.
The Kulkens name has been part of Melbourne’s psychic and metaphysical world for decades, with the business tracing its history back to 1969. Today the shop is in Belgrave in the Dandenong Ranges and continues to offer psychic readings alongside its metaphysical and witchcraft-related stock.
There aren’t many Melbourne businesses where you can draw such a direct line back through several decades of the city’s psychic, spiritualist and occult scene, which makes this one interesting beyond what happens to be sitting on the shelves.
If that side of things interests you, have a look through our Divination & Psychic Arts books as well.
Check before making a special trip, as the shop recommends contacting them before visiting.
SpellBox and The SpellBox Cauldron, Melbourne CBD
SpellBox hardly needs an introduction. It’s been part of Melbourne’s witchcraft scene since the 1990s and is probably the city’s best-known witchcraft retailer, particularly with tourists.
What is worth mentioning is that there are two SpellBox locations in the CBD.
There’s the familiar Royal Arcade shop, and just around the corner there’s The SpellBox Cauldron at 24 Block Place.
The Cauldron is much bigger than the Royal Arcade shop and is tucked away downstairs, below street level. It’s easy to walk straight past if you don’t know it’s there, but definitely worth heading down.
If you’ve only ever visited the Royal Arcade shop, you haven’t seen the whole thing.
Elfhame, Olinda
Elfhame is in Olinda in the Dandenong Ranges and is much more firmly rooted in witchcraft and folk magick than the average new age shop.
That distinction is probably the main reason to go. If your interests lean towards traditional witchcraft, folklore and magical practice rather than the broader crystals-and-wellness world, Elfhame makes a lot more sense.
And if folklore is your particular rabbit hole, have a dig through our Myth, Folklore & Legend books.
A few more Melbourne shops
Melbourne also has plenty of metaphysical stores where witchcraft, divination and occult interests overlap.
Sacred Source in Malvern has been around for years, while Crystal Wonderland in Altona North covers the western side of town.
Back to Basics in Williamstown is another longstanding independent, with its physical shop at 157 Nelson Place.
We could keep going. If there’s one thing Victoria is unlikely to suffer from anytime soon, it’s a shortage of crystal shops.
So we’ve tried to keep things somewhat focused rather than listing every establishment where you can buy an amethyst.
For the broader spiritual end of things, we also have Spirit & Mysticism and New Age & Spirituality.
Witchcraft and occult shops in regional Victoria
Melbourne doesn’t get everything.
Daylesford
If anywhere in regional Victoria was going to support several witchcraft, tarot and alternative spiritual businesses, Daylesford was hardly going to disappoint.
Euphemia Blackthorne’s Australian Witches Emporium
Euphemia Blackthorne’s Australian Witches Emporium at 119 Vincent Street is probably the most explicitly witchcraft-focused shop on our Daylesford list.
It’s an actual witches’ emporium, with occult and witchcraft supplies alongside tarot, palmistry, rune and medium readings, Reiki, spell consultations and Witch Academy workshops.
If you want witchcraft rather than generic metaphysical retail, start here.
The Empress & Wolf
The Empress & Wolf is at 35 Vincent Street.
It’s broader than a witchcraft shop, with jewellery, gifts, books, journals, tarot-related material, readings and events around intuition and spiritual development.
Daylesford Tarot Readers & Beyond the Gate Studio
Daylesford Tarot Readers & Beyond the Gate Studio is more about the reading than the shopping.
If you want a tarot reading while you’re in Daylesford, add it to the list.
And after all of that, our favourite Daylesford store may still be the charcoal chicken shop.
IYKYK.
Rochester
Dusty Rose Essentials in Rochester focuses on witchcraft, Pagan, Wiccan and ritual supplies.
For a regional shop outside the usual Daylesford and Dandenongs orbit, it’s a good one to know about.
Castlemaine
Castlemaine is less about finding one big witchcraft shop and more about wandering.
Merchants of Mostyn has an eclectic mix of locally made and unusual goods, jewellery, art, vintage pieces and curiosities.
Really, Castlemaine is one of those places where you’re better off allowing a couple of hours and seeing what you find in the independent shops, second-hand stores and vintage businesses around town.
Bendigo
Zenbu Bendigo has been operating for nearly three decades and carries jewellery, crystals, spiritual and symbolic items and tarot cards. It also arranges tarot readings in store.
It’s broader than witchcraft, but there’s enough crossover with tarot and metaphysical interests to include it here.
If there’s somewhere regional we’ve missed, tell us. We’ll keep adding to this as we find places.
Hunting for occult books in person
Of course, sometimes you aren’t looking for candles, herbs, crystals or ritual tools.
You just want books.
Some of our favourite finds have come from ordinary second-hand bookshops. There’s never any guarantee of what will be there, which is half the fun.
Brunswick Secondhand Books
Brunswick Secondhand Books is probably one of the better places in Melbourne to start.
Unlike a general second-hand shop where an occult book occasionally turns up by accident, Brunswick specifically deals in religion, mythology, spirituality and esoteric subjects.
Stock changes constantly, but if you’re interested in occultism, mythology, comparative religion or witchcraft, give yourself some time to go through the shelves properly.
Seddon Book Alley
Over in Melbourne’s west, Seddon Book Alley is one of our favourite general second-hand bookshops to rummage through.
It began as a pop-up in an actual alley before becoming a permanent shop in Seddon Village.
It isn’t an occult bookstore and the occult section isn’t enormous, but good things turn up. We’ve found some gems there, and it’s exactly the kind of shop where looking properly pays off.
City Basement Books, Melbourne CBD
City Basement Books is a wonderfully old-fashioned second-hand bookshop hidden below street level on Flinders Street.
The occult selection isn’t huge. Occasionally, though, something very good turns up.
This is less a case of going in knowing exactly what you want and more a case of giving yourself time to look.
Which, as far as we’re concerned, is how a second-hand bookshop should work.
The Theosophical Society Bookshop, Melbourne CBD
You really can’t talk about esoteric books in Melbourne without mentioning the TS Bookshop.
The bookshop grew out of the Melbourne Theosophical Society’s Reading Room, established in 1917, so there’s more than a century of history behind it.
Today you’ll find new and second-hand books covering Western esotericism, Pagan traditions, Theosophy, comparative religion, mythology and folklore, philosophy, New Age thought, Jung, astrology, tarot and divination.
There are dedicated second-hand and rare-book sections too.
If books are your main interest, rather than all the other stuff that tends to accumulate around them, go here.
And then there’s Astaroth Books
And, of course, there is us.
Astaroth Books is based in Melbourne’s west, but we are an online bookstore rather than a retail shop, so unfortunately there isn’t a mysterious little door you can knock on and ask to come inside.
At least not yet.
Our particular obsession is second-hand books: witchcraft, ceremonial magic and occultism, tarot and divination, folklore and mythology, mysticism, ancient worlds, paranormal phenomena and all the other subjects that tend to lead you down increasingly peculiar rabbit holes.
We’re also a much broader second-hand bookstore than the name might suggest. Alongside the occult shelves you’ll find Philosophy & Thought, History, Politics & Society, Queer, Counterculture & Radical Thought, psychology, art, weird fiction, biography, science and plenty of things that are difficult to categorise.
And there is a lot more coming.
We’re currently working our way through thousands of second-hand books waiting to be catalogued, with new ones going onto the site constantly.
So if you want to wander around an actual witchcraft shop, please do. Buy something while you’re there. We want these places to still exist in ten years.
But if what you’re really looking for is the book you didn’t know existed until you saw it, that’s where Astaroth Books comes in.
Have a look through Witchcraft, Magic & Occult, explore Divination & Psychic Arts, disappear into Myth, Folklore & Legend, venture into The Strange & Unexplained, or just check Just Unearthed to see what we’ve dragged out of the next box.
You never really know what’s going to turn up next.
Know somewhere we’ve missed?
Victoria’s witchcraft and occult community is much bigger than any list of shops.
And witchcraft and the occult aren’t really about what you buy anyway. They’re about practice, ideas, traditions, knowledge and people. Shops are just one part of that.
But good independent shops do matter. They give people somewhere to meet, browse, talk and stumble across things they would never have thought to search for online.
So if we’ve missed a small independent witchcraft shop, occult bookseller or second-hand bookshop with a particularly good esoteric section, tell us. We’ll add more as we find them.
And if you’re outside Victoria and want us to do one of these for your state, tell us that too.
At least it gives us an excuse to visit more strange little shops.
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