Your "Golden Ticket" to the World's Sweetest Candy Shops

Let us take you into a Wonka-esque world of pure imagination — and lots and lots of candy (GIF: Giphy)

Walk into a big candy store and it’s easy to turn into one of those five kids.

Maybe you’re a Veruca Salt, who wants that giant piece of candy right now. Perhaps you’re an Augustus Gloop, ready to dive headfirst into that river of chocolate. Or maybe you’re just a Charlie, lulled into a sugary trance.

Candy stores around the globe increasingly know how easy it is to create a little Willy Wonka-style theatrics — whether it’s by employing candymakers who stir bubbling pots of hot sugar right inside the door, or stacking their counters with glass jars stuffed with colorful, edible jewels.

Calm down, Veruca. We’re about to tell you where you can get your candy (GIF: Giphy)

Here are 10 shops — mostly stand-alone stores, not aligned with big brands — where your inner kid in a candy store can go wild:

Things can get gooey at Sweet! Hollywood (Photo: Sweet! Hollywood)

Sweet! Hollywood, Los Angeles

If any shop in the United States can claim to be Wonka-esque, it could be this larger-than-life store in Hollywood, where you can walk into the store on musical piano keys, behold a Ferrari-powered gumball machine, or get global candy samples from the Tasting Machines. The store includes a dozen-plus “boutiques,” such as one devoted to the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man and another to the mythic Mr. Wonka himself.

It’s always a sticky situation at Sticky! Hollywood (Photo: Margalit Francus/Flickr)

Top sugar high: Creating a personalized candy bar in the Chocolate Lab, using a variety of chocolates and up to 30 different mix-ins, from cookies to bacon bits.

Related: America’s Best Desserts: Chef Deb Pellegrino Shows Us the Sweet Life

The gigantic displays at Dubai’s aptly-named Candylicious (Photo: Phil/Flickr)

Candylicious, Dubai

At 10,000 square feet, this mega-shop in the similarly mega Dubai Mall claims to be the biggest candy store on the planet, with 5,000 different kinds of sweets, an in-store plane and truck, and strolling Jelly Bellies and Reese’s Bars who are amenable to photo ops.

Death by lollipop at Candylicious, Dubai (Photo: Thomas Galvez/Flickr)

Top sugar high: Even though you can find plenty of Western candies, you can also see how candy tastes in this part of the world run to the creamier side. Try the selection of Halal-certified sweets, such as gummy cola bottles and alligators, or the unique nougats, such as Cashew and Green Tea.

“Break me off a piece…” at Kit Kat Chocolatory, Tokyo (Photo: Facebook)

Kit Kat Chocolatory, Tokyo

Only in Japan can you find a candy shop that is comfortingly familiar and yet also mind-bendingly foreign. Kit Kats are reportedly the No. 1 candy in Japan and are even considered lucky (the similar-sounding phrase Kitto katsu means “You will surely win”). This boutique inside the Seibu Ikebukuro department store showcases Kit Kat’s wide range of only-in-Japan flavors — say, Purple Potato or European Cheese.

Top sugar high: Check out the specially made varieties (as though the others are mundane) created by Japanese chocolatier Yasumasa Takagi: Chili, Sublime Bitter, and Cherry Blossom Green Tea.

Related: Two Tokyo Restaurants Worth Your Yen

Dipping something in chocolate always makes it better. See that truism in action at Economy Candy (Photo: Robyn Lee/Flickr)

Economy Candy, New York

As the name suggests, this Lower East Side store is not the fanciest candy shop in New York, nor is it by any means the most whimsical in terms of aesthetics. But the densely packed, floor-to-ceiling inventory of the seemingly small Economy Candy is a perfect example of that only-in-New York kind of sensory overload. Want 40-plus kinds of Jelly Bellies, 10-pound boxes of chocolate sixlets, or even some retro wax lips or candy cigars? You’re covered. And then some.

The nuts and dried fruits at Economy Candy (Photo: Robyn Lee/Flickr)

Top sugar high: Don’t miss the deep selection of nuts and dried fruits — such as chocolate-covered sunflower seeds, roasted pepitas, or candied citron.

Related: Cool Off with These Best Ice Cream Shops in America

For sweet tooths who crave an old-school flavor: Shane Confectionery in Philadelphia (Photo: R’lyeh Imaging/Flickr)

Shane Confectionery, Philadelphia

This shop in Center City will appeal to sweet-toothed history buffs. With its tin ceilings and stained glass, it purports to be one of the nation’s oldest continuously run candy companies. The selection has a nice classic bent: fudge, saltwater taffy, and seriously vintage candy brands, such as Chiclets and Gibraltars.

After your Philly Cheesesteak, have a Shane Confection for dessert (Photo: Paul Muller/Flickr)

Top sugar high: The brandied cherries — liqueur-soaked, organic Oregon cherries dipped in dark chocolate — will put to shame those goo-filled cordials from your local drugstore.

Double Bacon Chocolate Bars at Big Top Candy Shop. Seriously: you had us at “double bacon” (Photo: Shelley N./Flickr)

Big Top Candy Shop, Austin

Texas hipsters can’t live on queso and craft beer alone. This South Congress emporium with more than 2,000 kinds of wrapped candies opened in 2007. But it embraces a retro vibe; it is festooned with circus memorabilia and offers such old-school perks as a soda fountain, where you can get a fizzy rose lemonade or an egg cream.

Top sugar high: Grownups still puzzling over that Pop Rocks-and-Pepsi urban myth can try the new generation of exploding candies — in popcorn, wasabi, and (but of course) bacon flavors.

It’s like Benihana, except with candy. See how the sweet stuff is made at Sticky, Sydney (Photo: Jonathan Lin/Flickr)

Sticky, Sydney

This artisanal rock-candy shop was started by a former lawyer and now has locations in Hong Kong, Singapore, and even Hollywood (inside the Sweet! shop). You can watch a confectioner roll the candy, but look closely at the results; many of the jewel-like candies have tiny messages (like “Bite Me”) inscribed in the centers.

Top sugar high: You can have them custom-make your own rolled candies or lollipops — with your own composed messages — in such flavors as blackcurrant, kiwi, eucalyptus, or even musk.

The sweets seem to go on forever at Chutters (Photo: Sebastian Bergmann/Flickr)

Chutters, Littleton, New Hampshire

At 112 feet long, the sweets counter at this New Hampshire legend boasts of being the longest in the world. It’s lined with roughly 800 jars, filled with classic fruit slices and gumballs, alongside truffles and penuche (a brown-sugar cousin of fudge). Another big hit: the retro candy bar section, featuring Zero bars, Charleston Chews, and Abba-Zabas.

Top sugar high: Don’t miss the popular (and huge) housemade s’mores: hockey-puck-shaped graham cracker and marshmallow treats dipped in chocolate.

Grape-flavored candy in progress at Spun Candy (Photo: Facebook)

Spun Candy, London

This shop in Covent Garden has boasted that many of its candy-makers have college degrees in design, and you can see for yourself as they stir and roll the confections in the shop’s open kitchen. As a cheeky reminder of the science of candy, the pick-a-mix bins are encased in a giant sugar-molecule display.

Top sugar high: If the delicate, long-stemmed candy roses seem too gorgeous to eat, go for the beloved butterscotch, which transcends the usual store-bought fare.

This Amsterdam candy store is a true Dutch treat (Photo: Courtesy of Het Oud-Hollandsch Snoepwinkeltje, Amsterdam)

Het Oud-Hollandsch Snoepwinkeltje, Amsterdam

The name is a mouthful, but it translates to “Old Dutch Candy Shop.” Run by a woman named Mariska, the shop is chock-a-block with intriguing sweets: black and white powders, soft cinnamon sticks, and polka brokken (“polka chunks,” made with butter and anise). The big star, though, is the drop, the classic Northern European candy made with salmiak, or salty licorice.

Top sugar high: You gotta go with the drop, such as the blueberry drop, the PEZ drop, the super-salty platte salmiakjes, or the duimdrop (which come in long strips, meant to be wrapped around your thumb then nibbled off). If you’re a newbie, try the kokindjes, a sweet drop that’s popular with kids.

Katrina Brown Hunt writes for TravelandLeisure.com and MiniTime.com. Based in California, she stuffs her luggage with boxes of See’s candies when she travels to see friends, which then creates space for their local candies to bring home.

Want more like this? Follow us on Facebook and Twitter so that we can inspire you every day.