Blockhouse Trading Company operates out of 11 Cornwall Road in Blockhouse, Nova Scotia, on a site with a genuine link to the community’s commercial past: the original building that housed a general store trading with locals a century ago still stands just across the road from the current shop. That history is baked into the business model, since Blockhouse Trading Company describes itself as a community consignment store that also hosts a local history exhibit, giving visitors something to read about as well as something to shop for.
The sales floor mixes vintage finds with new consigned goods and a notably eclectic gift section, including imported Japanese stationery and Moomin character merchandise alongside the vintage furniture, housewares, and collectibles typical of a small town consignment shop. That range means a visit can turn up anything from a piece of mid century glassware to a Moomin mug or a set of Japanese notebooks, a combination unusual enough to make the shop worth a special trip rather than just a stop on a broader antiquing route.
What genuinely differentiates Blockhouse Trading Company from a standard consignment shop is its charitable structure. Consigned items split their sale proceeds so that 20 percent goes to a local charity and 50 percent goes back to the consignor, while items donated outright to the shop send 70 percent of the sale price to charity. In 2026 the shop’s charitable proceeds are supporting the Mahone Bay Centre, a well known community and arts hub on Nova Scotia’s South Shore, which means every purchase does double duty as a small act of local support. That built in generosity, combined with the century old building story just across the road, gives the shop a sense of place and purpose that a purely transactional resale store cannot match.
Blockhouse Trading Company keeps a compact but clear schedule, open to walk in shoppers Friday through Sunday from noon to 5 in the evening, with other days available by request or by chance for anyone who happens to be passing through the village. That limited weekend window rewards planning a South Shore day trip around it, since Blockhouse sits within easy reach of Mahone Bay and Lunenburg for anyone stringing together stops at several small town shops. Visitors who time it right can browse vintage and consigned goods, pick up a distinctive gift, learn a bit about the village’s retail history, and know that part of their purchase is going back into the community, all within one modest storefront.
Unlike a straightforward antique mall, Blockhouse Trading Company treats its inventory and its local history exhibit as two sides of the same visit, so a customer looking for a specific vintage item may leave having also learned something about the building across the road and the general store trade it once represented. That layered experience, part shop and part small museum, is a rare combination for a village storefront of this size, and it rewards visitors who take the time to linger rather than rush through.
For South Shore visitors and Nova Scotia consignment shoppers alike, Blockhouse Trading Company in Blockhouse is a community minded consignment store and local history exhibit rolled into one, open Friday through Sunday, where vintage goods, Japanese stationery, and Moomin gifts share shelf space and every sale helps fund a local charity.
