There’s a new emporium in town!
After 25 years in the middle of Madison Street, Forest Park Emporium antique store closed its doors for a few days at the end of April and, this month, started selling antiques two blocks east at 7215 Madison St.
“I didn’t want to leave the market. I love Madison,” Marlene Tap, owner of Forest Park Emporium for the last 15 years, told the Review the week after the store’s May 9 grand reopening. She said she’d been looking for about 5 years for a new location, since the old “building needed a lot of work, the kind where we’d need to vacate.” When the store’s lease was up, she moved down the street.
The new location is slightly larger than the last, though walls are still lined with booths where individual dealers sell antique jewelry, glassware, furniture and clothing. At 7215 Madison St., there are separate rooms full of old items, while the last store was one open space. The booths are also larger at the new location, since a few less dealers moved with Forest Park Emporium.
“It’s not easy moving an antique mall,” Tap said. Movers transported six truckloads of antiques down Madison Street at the end of April. But Tap describes the new store as “cleaner, brighter, and cheerful.” With it, she hopes to grow her business. “We kind of all renewed ourselves,” she said of the move.
Tap’s own booth sits at the front of the antique store, just inside the left storefront window. Though Tap said she’s still working on filling her booth, it’s always been full of mid-century modern, art-deco and mission-style pieces.
Tom Krenek started Forest Park Emporium 25 years ago. Tap knew Krenek through local estate sales, and he was her antique dealer for several years as she sold pieces in Chicago. When Krenek was looking to sell the business, Tap took the helm, since she had experience running antique booths, plus an industrial design degree and minors in business and fine arts.
Krenek died in June 2023. A photo of him hangs on a wall above the cash registers when customers first come in.
“I hope Tom gets to see, wherever he is, everything we’ve done,” Tap said.