‘Coffee, cake and crystals’: Hartlepool crystal shop and cafe gets ready to expand

Gina’s Coven, a crystal and coffee shop in Station Lane, Seaton Carew, is getting ready to expand after five successful years.

Owner Gina Pontoni, 60, has been reading tarot cards since the age of 10 and decided to finally open the doors to her own place back in 2021.

She said: “When it was just the crystal shop and I was only open on a Saturday, I used to give people a coffee anyway, for free as they were mooching.

"I always had this vision of coffee, cake and crystals, and that’s when I opened the cafe.”

In December 2024, Gina opened a cafe in the shop, featuring a number of themed tables decorated with crystals and tarot cards for love, healing and luck.

And it has proved a big hit with customers.

"Kev, my fiance, had a good job at the time and I asked if he’d help me get it off the ground,” said Gina.

“It flew so much he decided to take it on full-time with me.”

Now she is expanding, with the shop shut from March 1 until March 10 followed by a larger refurbishment in the autumn.

Gia explained: "We started with coffee and cakes but people wanted more. My mum stepped in, making pies and soup – everything was homemade.

"We decided the next step was to start doing lunches, so paninis, toasties, wraps, that kind of thing.

“The first floor will be the coffee and crystal shop and then on the second floor, which is a huge room, there will be a coffee shop but more of a lounge, with sofas, nice music and sea views.

"Upstairs, on the third floor, is going to be my reading room, the tarot room.”

Gina currently gives tarot readings in a cabin next to the main shop building, but is looking at turning this into a dog-friendly “puppy coven”.

She said: “It’s something people have been asking about for a while now but we didn’t have the space.”

She added: “We’re going to be doing pupp-uccinos the lot. It’s so exciting.”