Ironside Antiques Mall — Local services in San Antonio

Summary: great place to check out if you like looking at other people's collections but don't plan on buying anything. This is a fun place to walk around and "window shop" actual antiques (90% not resale or crafts) don't expect to find a hidden treasure that isn't considerably more affordable on eBay or at an estate sale.

Location: it was really easy to find Ironside antiques Mall, and there is abundant parking very close to the door. Nothing about the location felt unsafe particularly during daylight hours. Ambience: this varies by booth or vendor but it's mostly like walking around a clean but cluttered collectors home. The most unpleasant part was that about half of the booths were cordoned off with chicken wire so you don't get to shop there for whatever reason. Sometimes there would be a piece of paper on the chicken wire with contact information if there was a certain item you wanted more information about, but that's not very helpful when it's an item you really need to inspect up close before you can make an offer and it would feel like a waste of the vendors' time to call them and then wait on them to come just so you can look more closely at something that you almost certainly could get at 1/5 of the price online. Prices: I'm sure I'll get some flack for this opinion but nothing in this place was priced to sell. For reference I came looking for particular stoneware dishes and I'm familiar enough to have an understanding that some colors or older versions will cost more than others, however I also have my cell phone which is connected to the internet so it's pretty easy to verify on the spot whether or not something is appropriately priced. At more than one booth and on more than one occasion I found an item priced literally 10 times what it would cost from multiple places online that had it for sale at that very moment, I'm not talking about past sales I mean things that were listed for sale at that moment that I could buy online that cost 1/10 of what they were listed for at the booth. Some of the most egregious offenders appeared to have purchased things from garage sales or even pick them up off of the street during bulky item pick-up and just added an extra zero to the end of the price tags. My example would be plastic pencil sharpeners under a glass case that were $2 a piece. If there was something special about these pencil sharpeners then I can see them being important and costing maybe $20 but when it's priced at $2 and it looks like it's broken and it says made in China I think it's pretty obvious that this is a piece of trash someone wants to display and probably won't ever sell. I might even ask the owners of this establishment if they are perhaps charging less for booth rental than a storage unit because it truly does appear several vendors are merely storing their items there with no intention to actually move the product. Caveat: I haven't been to every antique store in the city so perhaps there's something special about antique stores in San Antonio that means everything needs to be exorbitantly priced and poorly arranged, but I have been to several estate sales and numerous garage sales and of course I've been to lots of antique stores that are not in San Antonio and I can confirm this place was an outlier. Final thoughts: there's nothing about Ironside antiques malls that makes me say you absolutely shouldn't go here, but without some kind of oversight from the people who rent the booths to the vendors keeping them in line with how things should be arranged and when they should be available and the price of the items, I don't really see a reason to check...

I've been twice so far. Went a little after 10am on a weekday (they're closed Tuesday) and about half the shops were closed (you could look in but couldn't walk into the area). I was told by one store owner that if you can safely reach an item in a closed shop, you can bring it to another shop owner and pay for it. I walked around for an hour and as I was leaving, more shop owners were showing up to open their store, but I couldn't stick around. I returned on a Saturday afternoon to check out all those shops that had been closed on a weekday morning. Two shops that I was super interested in were still closed, and I was told by their neighbors that it was strange. I appreciated that there are public restrooms. I loved the variety of antique and vintage items to view, everything from video games & arcade games to decor & collectibles to clocks & lighting options to rare & unique items. A few shop owners kept an eye on me, but I can understand being worried about theft when so many small items are out in the open. Some shops are so extremely cluttered that is awkward to walk around or even step into them without worry of knocking into something. Some shop owners were friendly and others more reserved but not necessarily unfriendly. I noticed different things each time I visited so I'm looking forward to returning. Another reviewer said it was a museum that you could take things home and I agree that it feels a...

I’ve never encountered an antique mall set up like this before, and I hope I never do again. Rather than the traditional model where vendors rent space and leave their items to be sold by staff, this place operates more like a flea market. Each booth is staffed by the vendor, and some of the booths are so small that the vendor just sits in the middle, surrounded by their items. If you enjoy chatting with sellers, maybe this setup works for you. But for me, it felt awkward and uncomfortable. One of the main benefits of antique malls is that vendors don’t have to be present, yet here, most of the booths were closed off and unattended during our visit.

Overall, it felt like a missed opportunity for both the vendors and the customers. I left disappointed, feeling like the whole experience was a waste of time. I won’t...