A. T. Napoli
11/24/2025 - 7 min read

For the witch or witch-lover in your life, this holiday season, birthdays, and beyond. 🎁

Sage and salt? Some witch gift guides can be so cliché. So here I say:

🤓 No crystals. No tarot. No problem!

Whether you're a Joey gifting your Clark a prosperity plant like Matilda the Weeping Fig Tree, adopting a familiar like Leslie's Frank or Jessica, or protecting someone you care about with an evil eye like Emily, this is a B*TCHCRAFT🌙 Gift Guide for the witch or witch-lover in your life, this holiday season, birthdays, and beyond.

Below you'll find:

✨NOT YOUR AVERAGE WITCH
GIFT GUIDE ✨

• A Witch's Cult-Favorite Candle,

• How to Support Your Local Witch (and Their Rent), and

• The Glamour Cosmetic That Works on Everyone (+ My Dupe).

From my altar to yours, I am wishing you and your loved ones a Happy Holiday season full of warmth, wonder, and just the right amount of witch-bitch mischief to carry you into the new year.

xx,
A. T. Napoli

Lost? Not sure what to gift your witch? You've come to the right place.

Bewitched (1964), I Married A Witch (1942), and Sabrina the Teenage Witch (1996).

🌝 I'm convinced this single scent keeps Yankee Candle's lights on:

It's a total cult-classic, never-gets-old duh! to some, but for those who haven’t discovered the powers of Yankee Candle’s MidSummer’s Night®, consider this your formal initiation.

One of the brand’s best sellers. Midsummer's Night is a unique, masculine-to-unisex cologne (and as a black candle, an incredibly sexy one at that, rrrr!) which happens to be, in my experience, one of their most potent, long-lasting, high-value, high-performing products.

Officially: “a romantic evening of stargazing on a cool summer night” (like the cover of your favorite witch novel 👀). Personally? While I light it almost year-round, I find myself reaching for it more in the darker months (perfect for your ~witchy giftee~ this holiday season)(what?! We love alliteration and rhymes here, okay? Let me!).

It’s touted as a mahogany-masculine, fougère-style fragrance (French for “fern,” code for fresh and green):

The candle equivalent of a LBD (little black dress) or a classic red lip. 🖤

For the Witch Who Has Everything...

Top notes:
Citrus, Herbaceous, Woody, Bergamot, Lime.

Middle notes:
Lavender, Floral Sage, Naughty Pine (not officially "knotty" but if you get the reference, comment below✨),

Base notes:
Cedarwood, Vetiver, Juniper Berry, Clary Sage, Moss.

Debuting in 1994, MidSummer’s Night is a certified ‘90s witch staple. Think Practical Magic. Charmed. The Craft. Smart girls (and boys) know. For me, it smells like childhood and New York in the 90s: this candle, patchouli... and cigarettes (lol). Very typical of the rather witchy crowd my own Maria ran in.

🧟‍♂️ No Brainer

Whether they’ve burned it before or you’re lighting the match for them for the first time, MidSummer’s Night® is a high-impact, low-effort crowd-pleaser: dark, dreamy, and date-night ready. A total non-re-gifter, always re-lit, back-up-never-hurt-anybody, safe gift for you or your witch.

I'd say it would be an act of heresy for anyone to turn their nose up to it.

I so wish I could do that...
🕯️ Sandra Bullock in Practical Magic (1997).

☎️🧙‍♀️ Support your local witch this holiday season— or whenever!

This one's also a no-brainer, but what could say Happy Holidays more than a phone-a-psychic? No, I'm not kidding (kinda)!

About once a year, I'll book a reading with my psychic Leanne Marrama: a real-life practicing witch, high priestess, and co-founder of Salem institution, Pentagram: Witchcraft & Magick Shoppe on Essex Street.

I was fortunate to have interviewed the wonderful Leanne while writing Book One, The Witch's Assistant. When she told me ever so humbly, "I would never charge for a spell—that would be like charging for a prayer,' as I was writing a book series about a not-so-underground network of glamorous, rich, nefarious witches who do just that, well... I knew I was on the right track.

I could even be imagining it, but after Book One's release, I swear Pentagram started offering house calls like my own witches.✨

After all, in the witching world, there's certainly "big business around witchcraft"...

Got your psychic on speed dial like Charisma's coven? 🌹 Shannen Doherty and Rose McGowan in Charmed (1998). Did you know there's an episode named "House Call" in Season 5? Another B*TCHCRAFT🌙 synchronicity ✨

SPELLS SOLD SEPARATELY.

📲 First time? Not sure what to expect in your first session?

Whatever you do, don't show fear— they can smell it through your cell phone (kidding again. Sorta).

The brave of heart can direct their call any way they like, just let your witch know it's your first time. Try to let them and the (tarot) cards do the talking. Curious about communing with the spirit world? Ask if your psychic is fluent in mediumship.

🔮 The Veil is Thin, but Business is Booming

Pentagram offers 15- or 30-minute readings in-person, by phone, or virtually.

And yes, they can even assign you a witch.

Whether it's your local parlor-fortune teller, an Etsy witch who'll hex your ex for $12.99, or a friend-of-a-friend who "knows things," your witch will thank you.

💫Taking my beauty advice is like Michelle Pfeiffer's iconic transformation as Lamia the witch eating a star in Neil Gaiman's Stardust (2007). ~Vitalis guaranteedis~. You've been warned, witch.

PRACTICAL MAKEUP FOR PRACTICAL MAGIC

🪞🪄Since the 1970s, there's been one legendary beauty product that has quietly bewitched the world for generations. Fifty years later, and it remains an oft-imitated, rarely duplicated (until now) cult classic that refuses to age or disappear.

For the third slot on this year’s B*TCHCRAFT🌙 Holiday Gift Guide, allow me to introduce you to a true staple in every witch’s makeup-bag of tricks: Clinique’s Almost Lipstick in "Black Honey."

Touted as the black turtleneck of makeup, to swipe this discreet, silver-bulleted wand is to believe, no mirror required. Its magic? "Black Honey" appears deep raisin in tube and yet applies as a sheer wash that somehow flatters everyone and goes with everything. It's a truly unclockable, genderless, "you, but better" cosmetic. As in: you look like you when you wear it but, well, honestly? Much better.

Your ROI? Think blood rushing up to the surface. Circulation. A pulse beating beneath the skin (one hopes). A swipe of color, a wash of vitality. It makes a person look healthy and alive in the most effortless way. And if it fades and rubs off? Who cares! The color left is soft, lived-in, and quietly sexy, like you’ve been kissing someone hot and heavy.💋🌶️

"Black Honey" remains one of those rare beauty gifts you can give to absolutely anyone without guessing taste, sensibilities, or prior skill. It's an excellent token for the makeup- or magic-lover in your life, or the perfect first taste of glamour for someone just stepping into the coven.

Wicked's Cynthia Erivo for Clinique in their latest "Black Honey" campaign and the 2025 MET Gala. Pictured here in "Black Honey" and "Nude Honey." Click here to check out my mention in Allure for the second time on the legacy of BH 💄✨

Because I would be remiss to urge any of my readers to buy a $25 lip balm (or anything for that matter), here is my next-level, $8.99 dupe for Clinique's "Black Honey":

Enter Maybelline's Lifter Glaze™️ Lip Balm in "09 Latte Crush."

A skosh less bright than "Black Honey," and available in a range where every skintone can find their you-but-better-balm, ~currantly~ I find myself reaching for this most days. And, whereas Clinique's lack of fragrance or flavor can feel a touch joyless, to quote British beauty journalist Sali Hughes with Caroline Hirons, Maybelline's mild vanilla-gourmand flavor and hyaluronic acid make this a total treat for the lips (and the lovers).

The brand has been wonderful to me this year: not only did they gift me with almost the entire wardrobe of Lifter shades, they even sent me flowers for my birthday (look at all that Maybelline does for me. Step it up, you!**). I've already purchased a backup, and I will continue to do so for as long as the beauty gods allow (or... hehe... until it's simply no longer available). ✨

And...

A Dupe So Good It Could Start a Coven War...

The perfect, most B*TCHCRAFT🌙-coded names for a shade range ever 🙀😻☕️. The only thing missing? IMHO, emojis.

Maybe it's magic. Maybe it's Maybelline 🙂‍↕️🙂‍↕️

Did you know, the word “cosmetic” comes from the Greek kosmētikos, meaning “skilled in arranging or adorning," and kosmos, meaning “order” or “the world/universe." In essence, cosmetics are the art of arranging, harmonizing, and adorning your world. Pretty witchy to me! ✨

(**A Witch's Honor: Not sponsored, no commission, no affiliations. The (rather strong) opinions are entirely my own, PR samples (where noted) were gifted without obligation, and I repurchase everything I rate. Regularly.

But the Best Gift of Them All?

📚For glamour and grit wrapped in magic and Manhattan: when you've checked everyone off your list, pour a drink, light a candle, and treat yourself to your new favorite witch read, B*TCHCRAFT Book One, The Witch's Assistant 🌙. I know you're bound to love it.

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