It should come as no surprise that I am trash for a witchy house. I have Pinterest boards full of witchy decor ideas for my forever home, and my for-now home looks like a cozy hobbit hole behind an unassuming apartment door—a hobbit hole if said hobbit was into crystals, herbs, and other witchy goodness.

It me. I am that hobbit.

I’m not alone in this obsession. Not a Halloween season goes by that I don’t see the meme that, quite accurately states, “There’s only one thing girls witches want and that’s the Practical Magic House.” Although the house doesn’t really exist—the facade was built exclusively for the film and then taken down—IT IS FOREVER REAL IN OUR HEARTS.

This, I can assure you, is a FACT.

And it’s not the only magical house that has fired up our witchy hearts. We have the Halliwell Manor in the original Charmed and the reboot, not to mention one of my personal favorites, the gorgeous abode in The Witches of East End (2013), the outside of which, incidentally, is the same house in the Charmed reboot. Even shows like The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, The Addams Family franchise, and the recent Mayfair Witches are popular in part because of the gothic magical vibes of their interiors. We want to live in these houses!

This is not even getting into the glory of the fairytale witch house, from Baba Yaga’s home that sits on chicken feet to the strange hut buried deep in an enchanted forest that may be made of gingerbread or moss-covered stones but will always be full of magic and more than a little menace. Or the cottagecore vibes of the witches in Terry Pratchett’s Wyrd Sisters series…and so, so many more.

But why? What makes us love witchy houses in popular culture so much? Other than the fact that they are magical life goals, I mean. OBVIOUSLY.

As the bruja professor, I have a few theories about that…

Witchy Homes as Wild Sanctuary

First, I think it’s essential that we revisit Terri Windling’s lovely essay, “The Folklore of Hearth and Home.” In it, Windling draws on Jungian psychology to illustrate that homes are archetypal spaces, reflections of our psyche. It makes (magical and mundane) sense that our homes are the deepest reflection of who we are. Similarly, in her essay, “Wild Sanctuary,” Windling explores how Marie-Louise von Franz situates the wild wood of folklore as, in part, a reflective healing space the protagonist goes to when the outside world seems too complicated. I think, in many ways, the home can be a type of wild wood or magical realm we escape to when the world feels too fraught, the day-in, day-out too tiring. When we pair these two ideas together—home as archetypal psychic space and wild wood as sanctuary—we can see that the home becomes the site of our inner world, the place we retreat to in order to heal and reflect—and imagine a more magical way of being.

Pop culture pops out the concept of witchy houses as wild sanctuaries behind four walls and a door. It’s where we can be our more authentic selves, strip off the armor of the world, and just be. It’s also where we can tend our internal lives and our private lives…

More than that, the magical houses of literature, shows, and movies emphasize the domestic sphere as a sacred space.

Centering the Feminine Experience

The home, the private sphere, is often associated with the feminine. Most often, it is held secondary to the public sphere or masculine realm. I’m really trying hard not to do a deep dive into my graduate school work on 18th- and 19th-century courtship novels here, but I will say this: The courtship novel, like witchy media, is a genre that focuses on the domestic, the personal, and the private lives which are too often viewed as less-than in comparison with more traditionally masculine, extroverted narratives. Guess what? Both courtship novels and witchy media typically center on the feminine experience. Guess what else? The feminine experience is often seen as less important than the typical hero’s journey.

SHOCKER.

I mean, he goes out into the world and does stuff. She stays home and embroiders cushions. At least, that’s the stereotype, one that completely disregards women’s labor (both physical and emotional) and the importance of our internal lives. Regardless of your gender identity, I think everyone can benefit from celebrating the feminine aspects of their character. We all have both masculine and feminine archetypal energy within us, what Jung called the Anima and the Animus, and while some of his ideas on this are dated (um…what isn’t???), it’s important to remember that we all have a multitude of gender expressions within us. So when I speak of the witchy home as a uniquely feminine space, I’m not ignoring male-identifying witches or anyone who isn’t het-cis, etc., but rather celebrating what we all love about these houses, which is how they acknowledge the power of the traditionally coded-female domestic space and encourage us to honor the feminine-coded aspects of self.

Honoring the domestic sphere is just as important for men or people who don’t identify as women. I’m thinking, to draw once again on courtship novels, of Edward Ferrars in Sense & Sensibility. His mother wants him to be a stylish London lawyer. He, on the other hand, is quite at home in the domestic realm and ends up earning a living in a job that is much more suited to quite domestic pursuits. Let’s be real: Edward Ferrars is an introvert. And we can all relate to wanting a quite sanctuary to feel our feels in a world that wants us to be loud, extroverted, and masculine (yes, even Girl Bosses get burned out!).

But back to the heart of this essay—or should I say HEARTH?

Witchy stories and the houses they take place in have the magical ability to center women’s lives and see mundane things as, actually, quite enchanting. They go further to emphasize that often that stories that get swept under the rug are some of the most interesting, and the spaces we occupy carry the daily joys and dramas within their walls. I mean, who hasn’t buried an ex or two under the rose bushes? Who doesn’t hide their grimoire behind the fine china? Or bake a little spell into their brownies? Or go tell the bees important news? Just me?

The original Charmed is one of the longest-running TV series that centers on female protagonists. It covers everything from growing up in a non-traditional household, the dating lives of women (the joys and terrors), to starting your own business, going back to college as a non-traditional student, to getting married and having children, juggling work, kids, and saving the world, not to mention breastfeeding in public—you get the idea. So much happens in that house. Births, deaths, birthday parties, exorcisms…sure, it’s a show about magic and good versus evil, but, at its heart, it’s a show about sisters. And the lives of women.

The Personal is Political…and Magical

The final part of this VERY FORMAL STUDY on witchy houses is that they allow us to see our everyday lives as magical. Like the classic courtship novel that showcase how the personal is political (to borrow the phrase coined by Carol Hanisch in 1970), the witchy home explores how outer world issues (sexism, racism…seriously, pick your -ism) play out within a smaller, more confined scope—and how individual agency can create change when we feel helpless in the face of so much STUFF.

We have our gothic elements—the nightmares and demons, both literal and proverbial, that echo in our psyches and spaces—as well as the hopeful conjurings that make life more enchanting. These homes boldly make subtext text. The stuff we’re working through in our psyches become the demons and monsters we fight, the curses we break, the spells we cast. The monsters in The Charmed reboot (2018), for example, aren’t just ice demons but predators of the #MeToo variety (yeah, it’s a little on the nose, but what paranormal series following the Buffy the Vampire Slayer lineage isn’t?). Similarly, our personal breakthroughs have communal significance, like Sally “coming out” as a witch at the end of Practical Magic…if that’s not queer-coded, I don’t know what is. Or that fact that the sisters break the family curse, ending generational trauma for not only themselves but the next generation. See? The personal is not only political here but magical when we recognize our profound capacity as individuals to conjure change simply by being attuned to our truest selves (I could get into a lot about witches and social justice practices here, but that’s an essay for another time).

The Halliwells in both series aren’t just sisters or witches, but the Charmed Ones, and only by reconnecting in their ancestral home can they activate their powers, which speaks to the power of family, home, and ancestry on our futures. The sisters (again with the sisters!) in both Practical Magic and The Witches of East End are as bound to their home as they are to the curses that control their lives. In all of these examples, the home is the safe space, the sanctuary where these witches go to seek refuge from the evils of the world. Granted, the home in the original Charmed is often invaded by baddies, but that’s because it sits on a magical nexus of sorts which is basically a homing become for all things magical, so what are you going to do? All homes have their quirks.

Even in The Love Witch (2016), Elaine’s absolutely gorgeous home aesthetic is meant to contrast directly with her destructive nature. Sure, on the surface, she’s love and light….but underneath all that, she’s a toxic, traumatized individual who copes by inflicting that same trauma on others. But her house is so pretty! This is a great example of how her personal empowerment comes at the expense of others…not so magical, even if it looks good on the surface.

While we can empathize with how terribly she’s been exploited and abused, we also can’t condone the fact that her quick fix for healing trauma is to become the predator. Still, her home, filled with jewels, and herbs, and other spell-crafting material, is * chef’s kiss *. The home in this movie is a cautionary tale: Don’t confuse the witchy aesthetic with living right…but when you can be an ethical witch AND have your witchy aesthetic, too? That is truly magical!

So, on the one hand, we have the gothic elements of our lives literally hanging on the walls in our homes, like a terrible ex hexed into a painting for punishments and safekeeping (hello, The Witches of East End), and the proverbial ghosts of the people who came before us and other spirits (cough, cough, The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina). On the other, we have the absolute joy, the whimsy, the magic of gorgeous homes that are not only feasts for the senses but actually look lived in like in Practical Magic. Buh-bye, ultracold modernism! We want spaces that are loving, warm, and downright mystic.

What in the Whimsigoth?

Let’s face it, a huge part of what makes these stories so enjoyable is the aesthetics. Dancing from whimsigoth to cottagecore to retro glam, witchy homes embody the aspiration fantasy of what our lives can be (just, you know, don’t use your powers for evil or whatever).

They illustrate that our sanctuaries are magical spaces worthy of the time and attention it takes to make them sacred and healing expressions of self. They remind us that our daily lives can be imbued with magic—that everything, even down to washing dishes in a GORGEOUS kitchen, can be a form of spell work (cleansing spell, anyone?). The home is a space where you go to be your most magical and most yourself, protection wards in place, kettle on, family at the dinner table, grimier safely tucked away in the attic.

An Ode to Witch Homes

So much comes from nurturing these domestic spaces, so it only makes sense that we’ve fallen in love with books and films that romanticize our sanctuaries. I mean, doesn’t it just make sense that our private spaces should be works of art and lovingly tended? 

It also quite subtly addresses women’s labor (traditionally): the magic of a well-made soup, the quiet conjuring of cleaning the house or caring for the familiars, I mean, pets, under your care, not to mention the power of a shared pot of tea and a leisurely conversation. Much can be worked through, much conjured over an afternoon cup of chamomile.

In many ways, we remember the houses more than the plot of specific stories. Like The Big City in a romcom, houses are the third protagonist of any good witchy story. Conversely, like The Small Town (very, very idealized) in a romcom, a house in a witchy story reminds us of the quiet, simple magic of daily life—no need to go to far-flung places to search for magic. It’s right in front of us. Homes are where we spend most of our time, where we are most ourselves. At the end of the day, these witchy homes remind us who we want to be—who we can be, what we can conjure, if only we remember we are magic.

The Bruja Professor, a witchy take on literature, the occult & pop culture, is the scholarly sister to Enchantment Learning & Living, an inspirational blog celebrating life’s simple pleasures, everyday mysticism, and delectable recipes that are guaranteed to stir the kitchen witch in you.

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