Welcome to Lumena Crystals. You’ve just wandered into a shop full of things that took millions of years to grow.

I’m Kate, the owner of Lumena, and a certified crystal healer. I’ve spent over twenty five years using crystals for healing, and picking them up and peering into them, and I still get joyfully excited when the light catches something in them that I hadn’t spotted before, or I spy a tiny rainbow hidden away, waiting for its moment to be seen. Every crystal here has been consciously sourced and hand-picked by me, and this means I instantly know whether a crystal should be with us or not. I go by intuition and heart, not trends, and if it doesn’t match our vibe, it doesn’t come to us.

I know real life is busy, and most days don’t leave room for complicated extras, so around here we pop a crystal in our bra or our pocket and get on with our day. You won’t find a rule book either, because everything at Lumena runs on intuition, and intuition usually knows exactly what it’s doing.

I’ve been in love with crystals and finding treasure in the earth for as long as I can remember, but it took some of the hardest years of my life to show me what they could really do.

We went through two rounds of IVF to have our son, and all the way through it my rose quartz chunk, a crystal I’d had since my teens, stayed close and reminded me to keep hold of some compassion for myself.

Then after he arrived, I was hit with severe postnatal depression and anxiety. One evening, after yet another five hour long panic attack, I decided that this way of living couldn’t carry on, and a short internet search led me to an anxiety charity. They gave me some brilliant coping tools, and that’s where I fell in love with meditating. My crystal collection was small back then, but they soon found their way into my practice, and choosing which ones never felt like choosing at all, because it always seemed to be a particular crystal leaping off my shelf saying “pick me!” Satin Spar became my shield against negativity, my own thoughts as much as everyone else’s energy. Rainbow Fluorite kept me steady when overwhelm turned into anger.

It was as I was healing from my postnatal mental health, still relying heavily on meditation and crystals in my recovery, that I got a strong calling that this was what I needed to do… to share my love and knowledge with the world and open an online crystal shop. That calling was one I took seriously, so I went and qualified in crystal healing, then chakra and aura healing with crystals, and then, because the animals in our lives deserve some magic too, crystal healing for pets. And the learning has never really stopped, because the universe is full of secrets waiting to be explored, and I fully intend to keep exploring them.

The longer you stick around, the more you’ll notice we do things a little differently here at Lumena. Everything is built on curiosity, wonder and excitement, because every crystal that arrives here has its own story to tell, the millions of years it took to grow, the markings and rainbows and shadows that belong to that piece and no other. My job is to peer in close, find that story, and share it with you properly.

Every piece gets photographed individually, partly because of those stories each crystal has to tell, and partly because, much like you, every crystal is completely unique. I also know exactly what it’s like to shop online, fall in love with a crystal, order it, and then have something different turn up because the website used a general stock photo rather than the actual piece they’d be sending. I know how disappointing that feels, so from our very first day, we’ve done things differently, because you deserve better, and so do the crystals.

Where your crystals come from matters just as much. When it came to choosing suppliers, I looked really hard at their ethical statements and started asking questions from there, and those conversations have carried on ever since. It’s how I know the miners have been supplied with proper safety gear over the years, right down to the updates when new helmets arrive.

And the care carries on right up until your order leaves the house. Inside your box you’ll find your crystals along with mini healing guides for every crystal you’ve ordered, so each piece arrives with its story ready to be explored. Everything comes packaged in recyclable glassine bags or gift boxes, or an organza bag if you’ve chosen a collection, the box is filled with biodegradable packing peanuts, and even the box itself can be collapsed and reused, or popped straight into your recycling.

Since we first opened our virtual doors back in 2017, we’ve grown from what was once The Little Crystal Lounge into what is now Lumena, an online crystal shop based in the UK. When I first started, I ran the business from the corner of my lounge in my home based in Widnes, just outside Liverpool, photographing stock and packing orders on our dining table, but we’ve grown into something much bigger than I ever thought we would. These days there’s a dedicated office with room for all the stock, packing and photography, and a comfy space where I can chat to you all in a relaxed way, rather than feeling squished in amongst real life and family spaces.

And somewhere along the way, we outgrew the name too. Lumena comes from the Latin root lumen, meaning light, though it also means maiden of light, and when I found that out, it just felt right in a way that nothing else had. The full story of how the name found me lives over on the blog (Click here to read), and I’d love you to read it. Whilst I was pondering over the future of my crystal shop, there’s a photograph of me at around six years old that I kept coming back to. I’m sitting on our back garden steps surrounded by pots and petals, long white hair catching the light, completely lost in a world of homemade potions and perfumes. That little girl was already doing everything I do now, gathering treasures from nature and sharing their magic with everyone around her, and her light was already there, long before a single crystal ever found its way to her. It was always hers. And that was the message I wanted to bring with me…

The light never started with the stone. It started with you.