The Old Sawmill Cafe, Clapham: Yorkshire cafe located at Ingleborough Cave celebrates its one-year anniversary while its building dates back to the 19th century

The Old Sawmill Cafe celebrated its one-year anniversary on Saturday, July 22, 2023.

It was decked with decorations, the team indulged in pizzas sourced from a local takeaway, a cake was specially made for the occasion by a local bakery called Settle for Cake and the team gathered together toasting with champagne and reflected on the past year.

The cafe is a listed building as the first verifiable of a building or barn on the site of The Old Sawmill dates back to 1851, shown on the Tithe Map for Clapham with Newby and on the first Ordnance Survey map of the same date.

The size and position of the building on the map corresponds exactly with the oldest section of the sawmill, and the 1896 Ordnance Survey map shows an extended building with an identical imprint to the current sawmill.

However, records show the presence of a corn mill and fulfilling mill for processing wool in Clapham as far back as the 12th century.

For decades the downstairs area of the building has been derelict and only used as storage for paraphernalia required on a rural estate, including tools, machinery, fencing, piping and drainage equipment and the upstairs was used as a joinery workshop.

The managing director at Ingleborough Cave and Nature Trail, Andrew Jarman, along with his team put in a pre-planning application to the Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority with the view to renovate the building for public use.

“We’ve always been aware that this building was ideally situated at the start of the nature trail to provide a sort of hub at the Cave entrance; primarily because it is a very popular tourist attraction,” Mr Jarman said.

“I put in a pre-planning application [sent to] the Yorkshire Dales National Park just to get a bit of initial feedback on what might be viable, it looked positive but then we realised that it would be an incredibly costly venture to do properly.

“We put a small ticket hut at the nature trail entrance and started manning the ticket office so that we could get a better feel and build a better picture of whether it would be worthwhile and over five years, we concluded that there was a demand for it.

“It was not long before Covid that we started working with an architect from Lancaster and started painting a picture and putting plans together of what it might look like.

“That took quite a while to develop and then obviously Covid slowed things down. Eventually we came to what we wanted it to be and then the work started; the physical work took over a year.”

With its deep history, a number of discoveries were found when the building was cleared out before renovation. These artefacts have been kept safe and are displayed around the cafe.

“The building is incredibly unique,” Mr Jarman said.

“It was entirely derelict before we started renovation; the physical renovation took a year but the work preparing, planning, figuring out how we were going to do it and whether it was worthwhile because it wasn’t cheap, took many years of research.

“We worked closely with the [Yorkshire Dales] National Park and we kept all of the original features, so the old saw bench is still in place and forms the centrepiece of the building.

“We suspended a lot of old tools that were used in the sawmill from the roofs. The old turbine room is open with storyboards and information.

“That is very interesting because Clapham was one of the first villages to utilise hydroelectricity in the country.

“The turbine that runs from the water coming from the lake on the nature trail would power one lightbulb in every single house in the village, going back centuries.

“That is an incredible piece of history that is interesting to families, kids, adults who come to see us. I think the building itself really helps us to stand out, stand apart.

“It’s a big building but unless you knew what you were looking at you wouldn’t know it was there.

“When people first found out we were [building] a cafe, a few people, not villagers because generally it’s quite obvious to villagers, wondered where it was going to be built, they didn’t think it would be in this building because it’s fairly inconspicuous.”

Many customers have loved the cafe and its unique stamp on the village.

“Part of our thinking was always for the cafe to have its own identity because it would have been very easy for it to just fall into ‘oh that’s the cafe for the nature trail and cave’, which were keen for it not to be,” Mr Jarman said.

“A lot of tourist attractions have their own cafes, we were keen for it not to be that kind of diner for people on the trail to use it [simply] for convenience.

“We were eager for it to have its own identity, develop its own reputation, bring in its own customers and so far that has been happening and we’re delighted with that.

“A lot commented that it was nice to finally have somewhere in the village that’s open and we do specialty coffee from a local supplier, we have all our tray bakes and cakes made inhouse and we are really trying to focus on a top quality product at a fair price.

“Most locals were commenting that if they are meeting a friend or they’re going on a walk and fancy somewhere afterwards or a little treat or they’ve got family staying and want somewhere to go, it’s good to have somewhere where they know they can go and get a decent products and show visitors a nice little cafe in the village.”

Andrew told The Yorkshire Post the various areas in the cafe where visitors can learn about its history and observe some of its original features.

“We’ve suspended a number of the old tools which are on display, you can’t miss them and the old saw blade available underneath,” he said.

“In terms of little odds and ends, we’ve kept some of the old signs, which is quite cool, so we’ve kept the odd safety signs like ‘treatment of electric shock’ and retro signs in place.

“A couple of interesting things; when the work was about to start we had to clear out the building, so myself and two of the trustees of the estate basically gutted the place.

“Obviously there were a lot of old tools and we didn’t chuck anything, we thought we’d keep all of this and then we took the interior designer who brought in help into the barn and basically let her sift through all of the stuff.

“We also bought a couple of tables where we set the old saw blades with a glass covering which is a cool thing to look out for.

“We also found, when we were emptying the building, an old pick with ‘RJF’ inscribed into it, which almost certainly belonged to Reginald John Farrer.

“He was a very famous plant collector and grew up on the estate from 1880 to 1920; he travelled the world collecting all sorts of plants.

“His legacy still lives on at the nature trail with various plants he brought in, particularly a collection of rhododendrons that have some national champions in there, some of the biggest in the country. A fantastic collection.”