Best stores for zines in San Francisco

August 4, 2013 7:24 PM

I'll be in San Francisco for about twelve hours, and I would like to find a bookstore or two that have an amazing zine selection. Any suggestions?

My girlfriend wants to see the Haight-Ashbury area and check out the Golden Gate Bridge, so we need to do those things, too. I would welcome ANY suggestions of good stores to visit, but if you have ones that are particularly convenient to Haight-Ashbury that would be cool.

posted by Unified Theory to Shopping (5 answers total)

Best answer: Try Goteblüd if you're here on a weekend, you can take a 33 bus from there to Haight + Masonic. There's an anarchist-oriented bookstore called Bound Together in the Upper Haight that's more niche but could be interesting. Then you can take a 43 to the bridge - almost. Might want to take a taxi if you don't have the time to walk Crissy Field to the actual bridge.
posted by kcm at 7:30 PM on August 4, 2013

Best answer: I'd recommend Needles & Pens in the Mission and if you're also into mini-comics and small press comics, you should check out Mission:Comics & Art. If the owner, Leef, is there he should be able to direct you to other spots in the neighborhood. If you end up near China Town and North Beach (SF's Little Italy), City Lights Bookstore also used to have a large zine section. I haven't been there I several years, but I'm pretty sure nothing has changed. It's also a very famous and historical bookstore in its own right.
posted by quince at 7:53 PM on August 4, 2013 [3 favorites]

Best answer: Yeah, City Lights has a solid zine collection and is a tourist attraction in it's own right. Check it out!
posted by saul wright at 3:59 AM on August 5, 2013

Best answer: Comix Experience on Divisadero has quite a few zines, but the forementioned Needles and Pens on 16th probably has a better selection.

Comix Experience is a few blocks from the Upper Haight - just walk down to Divisadero and turn left.
posted by gyusan at 9:20 AM on August 5, 2013

Response by poster: Success! I made it to both Comix Experience and City Lights, and bought interesting zines at both. Both stores are great but I found City Lights' selection to be more in tune with what interests me, which is primarily stories and text. Comix Experience has great stuff but most of its zine selection is comics zines which makes sense given that it is a comics store.

Thanks for the help!
posted by Unified Theory at 8:28 PM on August 9, 2013