Occult Bookstore Near Me on Clement Street: Tarot Finds at Green Apple Books

Not everyone who types occult bookstore near me wants candles and crystals. Some people just want the books: a solid Rider-Waite guide, a witchcraft primer, a used copy of something long out of print. In the Inner Richmond the answer is Green Apple Books at 506 Clement Street, a general new-and-used bookstore founded in 1967 whose shelves reliably turn up tarot classics and modern magick titles alongside everything else a serious reader could want.

Be clear about what kind of place this is before you go. Green Apple is not an esoteric specialist with ritual tools and readers on call. It is a big, independent general bookstore where occult and spiritual books share the building with fiction, history and cookbooks. That is exactly its value for this search: the selection is broader than most metaphysical shops, the prices are ordinary bookstore prices, and used copies mean older titles appear that a newer shop would never stock.

The best proof is a title every tarot reader eventually wants. A. E. Waite's The Pictorial Key to the Tarot, the companion text to the deck most beginners learn on, is listed on the store's website at $16.95, and the Clement store showed it as on hand as of October 14. Pick it up if you are starting with the Rider-Waite imagery, because Waite's own descriptions of each card explain symbols that many modern guidebooks skip.

For a deeper course of study, the store's catalog also lists Christopher Penczak's The Inner Temple of Witchcraft, a Llewellyn title built around magick, meditation and psychic development, at $50.00. Availability varies by title and store, so the practical move is to search the website before you leave home, see which branch shows a copy, and ask staff to hold or order it if it is not already on the shelf you plan to visit.

The used side is where patient browsing pays off. Green Apple buys books and music from the public, with buyback hours from 10 am to 6 pm, so the stock keeps shifting as Richmond District readers clear their shelves. That churn is why a small esoteric collection can appear one week and vanish the next. If you own occult books you no longer need, bring them during buyback hours and leave with credit toward something new.

Hours are some of the longest of any bookstore in the city: the Clement Street shop opens from 10 am to 9 pm every day, Sunday through Saturday. Weekday mornings are the calmest time to dig through the used sections without bumping into other browsers. Evenings and weekend afternoons are busier, especially when diners from the Clement Street restaurants wander in before or after a meal, so go early if you plan to spend an hour on one aisle.

The building is part of the experience. The store describes itself as occupying a pre-1906 Richmond District building near the corner of Clement and 6th Avenue. Gas light fixtures are still visible on the second floor, and the store itself admits that the stairs still creak. Climbing those stairs with an armful of secondhand paperbacks, past shelves that seem to go on forever, gives the hunt for an odd old book the right mood.

The history runs deep for a neighborhood shop. According to the store, Richard Savoy founded Green Apple Books in 1967, when he was 25 years old. Starting in 1999, three employees bought into the business, and the current owners are Kevin Ryan and Pete Mulvihill; Kevin Hunsanger, another co-owner, sold his shares in 2018. The store calls itself one of a trio of fiercely independent bookstores, and the Clement Street building is where the story began.

There used to be more on the block. In 1996 Green Apple took over two storefronts a few doors down and acquired Revolver Records for music, and that annex closed in 2021 as sales declined, according to the store's history page. Older guides still mention the annex, so if you read a description of fiction and music across the street, it is out of date; everything now happens in the main building at 506 Clement.

Afterward, Clement Street is one of the best eating streets in San Francisco for an unplanned stroll. Burma Superstar, at 309 Clement Street, is a few blocks east and famous for its tea leaf salad, though the wait for a table can be long at dinner. The blocks between 2nd and 10th Avenues are lined with bakeries, dim sum counters and produce markets, which makes this an easy afternoon of browsing and snacking with your new books in hand.

Email goes to query@greenapplebooks.com. Groups planning a visit, such as a class or book club, are asked to call at least a day in advance. The store website carries its own accessibility information page for visitors who need details about the building's floors and stairs.

Plan the search smartly. Before you visit, use the website to check a few occult titles you want, then build a short list: one tarot reference, one history of magic, one practical guide. Once inside, ask staff which shelves hold tarot, witchcraft and esoteric titles, then walk the used sections slowly, because older occult books can end up filed under religion, history or philosophy. Keep an open mind, since the best find of the day may be one you did not plan on.

Green Apple also works well as part of a wider occult day in the city. Pair it with a trip to a dedicated metaphysical shop for incense, candles or a reading, and come here for the reading material that explains what all those tools are for. Clement Street to the Haight or Cole Valley is a short bus ride across Golden Gate Park, so the books and the supplies can be gathered in a single afternoon.

This is the right stop for readers who want texts rather than trinkets, for beginners who need a dependable tarot reference at a normal price, and for collectors who enjoy rummaging through used stacks for something unexpected. Anyone looking for ritual supplies or an on-site reader should go elsewhere first. Karpo APP can help you plan the rest of the Richmond District, from a bakery stop on Clement to a long walk in Golden Gate Park.