A CAFE has opened its doors for the first time after a long-term renovation project.

The Old Sawmill Café has opened at the entrance of the Ingleborough Estate Nature Trail which leads to Ingleborough Cave.

The cafe is located in a listed building which was previously used as a sawmill. The heritage and history has been 'beautifully preserved' providing a fascinating backdrop for visitors to immerse themselves in whilst enjoying the use of the cafe.

Manager of The Old Sawmill Café Andrew Jarman said: "The building has been fairly derelict for a long time and used for storage of estate tools.

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"Myself with the trustees of the estate decided it would be useful as a cafe, we started doing research five years ago and we have now opened it as a cafe."

Mr Jarman said the feedback from customers had been 'fantastic' and that the team were 'delighted ' by the feedback they have received. 

The cafe features the original saw and saw blade and old saw blades which have been set in the tables as features.

In the former sawmill, there is also a ticket foyer for the nature trail and the cave, which is helping bring in customers to the cafe as people are seeing what the cafe has to offer.

On why they wanted to open the cafe, Mr Jarman said: "Clapham has been screaming out for a cafe that is reliable and open seven days a week.

"It is a popular tourist village, particularly with Ingleborough cave being here but also it is a popular route up to Ingleborough.

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"We did discuss a few options but combining our ticketing with a cafe offering that seemed like the most sensible thing to do, be of interested and generate good business."

The restoration work took under one year to be completed but the overall project from having the initial idea to opening took five years.

Mr Jarman said the pandemic slowed down the project.