Metropolis, Illinois trades on its Superman connection more than almost any other town its size, home to a giant statue of the superhero and an annual Superman Celebration each June, and two blocks from that statue at 700 Market Street sits Super City Antiques and Collectibles, a 6,000 square foot showroom that leans into the theme without making it the whole story. Alongside a selection of Superman souvenirs, the shop’s real draw is the sheer range of genuine antique and collectible categories packed into a restored late 1800s building: vintage vinyl records, comic books, musical instruments, coins, glassware, antique furniture, jewelry, toys, advertising signs, primitives, and old-fashioned candy all share space under the building’s original 14-foot tin-tiled ceilings and exposed brick walls.
One category stands out from the rest: owners Adron, Leeann, Henry Henley, and Joey have assembled what they describe as the largest marble collection in Southern Illinois, a specific and somewhat unusual specialty that gives the shop a genuine claim to fame beyond its Superman-adjacent location. That kind of focused collecting niche, alongside the more expected comic book and vinyl record sections, is what tends to bring repeat visits from serious collectors rather than just one-time tourists in town for the statue.
The building itself opened as Super City Antiques and Collectibles in May 2016, following a renovation that preserved its late 19th century architectural details rather than covering them over, a choice that gives the showroom a historic backdrop for merchandise that is itself often decades old. The shop is open Tuesday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., closed Sunday and Monday, a schedule that leaves room for the owners to process new inventory, which they say arrives sometimes daily, keeping the sales floor in near-constant rotation.
For shoppers who cannot get to downtown Metropolis in person, Super City Antiques and Collectibles offers online shopping with a choice of in-store pickup or delivery, and the shop accepts consignments from sellers looking to place items in a high-traffic tourist location. That consignment option, combined with the daily-ish restocking pace, means the inventory a visitor sees in a given week is unlikely to be identical to what was there the week before, reinforcing the shop’s own promise of a surprise around every corner.
Downtown Metropolis draws a specific kind of foot traffic that most small Illinois towns do not get: comic and pop culture fans visiting the Superman statue and, especially during the June Superman Celebration, thousands of festival visitors passing within a couple of blocks of the shop’s door. Super City Antiques and Collectibles turns that tourist flow into a browsing opportunity for genuine antiques and collectibles, not just novelty souvenirs, giving Metropolis a specialty shop that pairs its pop culture fame with a serious multi-category collectibles inventory. Super City Antiques and Collectibles in Metropolis, Illinois is a 6,000 square foot antiques and collectibles showroom two blocks from the Superman statue, known for housing the largest marble collection in Southern Illinois inside a restored 1800s building with its original tin ceilings intact.
