On Kemp Lane in Easton’s East End, inside a building that once hummed as a poultry hatchery, more than 40 independent vendors now share space instead of chicks and feed troughs. Big Rooster Mall opened in November 2023, timed to coincide with the town’s Waterfowl Festival, after owner G.M. Bell purchased the property in 2020 to store pieces from his late father’s antique shop in Maine. What began as overflow storage grew into a full multi-dealer mall once Laurie Gaffney, who was already renting space in the building for her own antique business, joined forces with Bell and former building owner Bob Porter, who still runs his sign shop, Sharper Signs and Graphics, on site. That layered history gives the mall a genuine sense of place: shoppers browse booths, display cases, and wall sections leased by individual sellers, all under one roof that has quietly shifted from agricultural use to retail reuse without losing its Eastern Shore character.
Inside, the mix runs wide. Vendors stock antique and vintage furniture, holiday decorations, vintage advertising signage, nautical and Chesapeake seafood themed pieces, estate jewelry, toys, and the kind of artisan made goods that do not fit neatly into a single category. Because each booth is curated by its own dealer, inventory turns over constantly, and regulars know that a return visit rarely looks like the last one. The mall bills itself around the tagline Antiques, Vintage, Artisans, Fantastic Finds, and More, a fair summary of a space built for slow, unhurried browsing rather than a quick in and out errand.
Big Rooster Mall keeps limited hours, open Tuesday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. and closed Sundays and Mondays, which fits its role as a destination stop rather than a daily use shop. It sits within easy walking distance of downtown Easton’s other shops and restaurants, making it a natural stop for visitors who plan a full afternoon around the town’s antiques and vintage scene, particularly during organized events like Easton’s Vintage and Antique Markets Day, when the mall becomes one of several participating stops across the historic district.
What sets Big Rooster Mall apart from a typical antique mall is less about any single object and more about the collaboration behind it. Three people with different relationships to the building, an antiques collector storing his father’s inventory, a dealer already established on site, and the property’s former owner, chose to combine efforts rather than compete for the same square footage. That partnership shows up in the range of goods on the floor, since no single dealer’s taste dominates the space, and in the steady growth from a partially leased opening toward the mall’s full vendor capacity. For Talbot County shoppers and Eastern Shore visitors alike, the result is a rotating, multi vendor snapshot of what collectors across the region are currently pulling out of attics, storage units, and estate sales.
Big Rooster Mall is a multi-dealer antique and vintage mall on Kemp Lane in Easton, Maryland, housed in a former hatchery building and home to more than 40 independent vendors selling furniture, collectibles, jewelry, and artisan goods, open Tuesday through Saturday.
