Alchemists Head

Skerries

I used to buy my stuff there but I can't actually remeber the original location before it went to Dame St
All I can remember is that it was off Dame st somewhere maybe close to the quays so if if anyone could google map it for me that would be great

Johnner69

Originally The Alchemist's Head was across from The Project Arts Centre on Essex Street East. Sub City has recently relocated pretty close to where the shop was on Dame Street - maybe even the same premises, though probably not. Do you remember The Rue Morgue? It was on Fownes Street Upper, beside the Central Bank.

Jim Comic

the rue morque was run by terry and john, can't recall their surnames alas

i was a big comics collector and my mam heard about the alchemists head on the gay byrne radio show one morning and told me about it, i almost exploded with excitement at the thought of an actual comics shop in ireland

she got the address slightly wrong so next time we were in dublin me and my dad ended out in dun laoghaire looking for the shop… think we ended up in sussex street D.L., rather than essex street temple bar, but got there eventually… worked in dublin a few years later and the alchemists head were the recipients of practically all my disposable income

JayRoc

I remember the Alchemist's Head as being on George's Street, am I wrong? On the right hand side if you're coming from Dame Street

Johnner69

I don’t know if you’ve triggered a false memory in me, but now that you mention an incarnation of The Alchemist’s Head on Lower George’s Street I begin to think I remember it being located there at some point. Maybe we both just experienced some overlap on the geography of our dreams.

A 1986 video on RTE Archives (titled: Explaining the Unexplained – https://www.rte.ie/archives/2021/0130/1189787-the-occult/ ) interviews the owner of The Alchemist’s Head at 4:40 and 7:10. You don’t see much of the shop – on East Essex Street at the time – but it takes you back, all the same. I’d have been in there pretty much every week in the years 85 to 87, getting my Alan Moore fix – Swamp-Thing, Watchmen, Miracleman etc. Good times.

There was a comics shop in Dun Laoghaire, too – in the 90s, at any rate. Originally a stall in a market in the vicinity of St Michael’s Church on Marine Road, it relocated to the shopping centre across the road. I remember picking up a lot of Sandman comics there.

JayRoc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123771243#Comment_123771243

I was a security officer in the Dun Laoghaire shopping centre during the late 90s/early 2000s and got to know Pat (the guy who owned the comic shop) so well that when I was doing nights (you'd be the only human in the whole centre for 8 or 9 hours) I would call in to the shop at the start of a shift and he would load me up with back issues I would read overnight in the security room and drop back in the morning.

An absolute gent

Johnner69

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123773245#Comment_123773245

Forget about 'growth mindset culture' and 'career progression' — you've just described my dream job. I'm thinking now that if I can create a need for an overnight security officer in Forbidden Planet, I'd deffo apply for the position. Just have to break into the place a couple of times now to create that need.

JayRoc

One night I brought in a vcr and watched Lawrence of Arabia in wide-screen on one of the tiny security monitors. Not the best way to see that particular film

JayRoc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123771243#Comment_123771243

Actually, talking of Dun Laoghaire/Harbour market, you've reminded me that when I was eleven (the youngest stallholder they'd ever had apparently) I had a stall in the Blackrock Market selling comic books. Good times.

Everlong1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/89588313#Comment_89588313

This is correct but not sure what you mean about the Sub City place on Dame Street - as you said the AH was in Essex Street. Teenage me loved the place as it was literally the only one of it's kind in Dublin in the early '80's. Bought my first Stephen King book there. Heartbroken when it closed.

selenie

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/123776023#Comment_123776023

The Alchemist’s Head was definitely on East Essex Street in the mid-80s. The Sub City mention was just because their Dame Street shop later ended up very close to where people remembered AH being, which probably caused some of the confusion. Funny how those early shops stick in the memory though when they were pretty much the only place in Dublin you could get that kind of stuff back then.