Lilac Bakery

Aim

We are setting up a community bakery-café and creative space in St. Thomas.

We are setting up a community bakery-café and creative space in St. Thomas. Think homemade sourdough and pastries, specialty coffee, breakfasts, brunch and a large relaxed indoor and outdoor dining space.  We want to build a creative, family friendly venue, working with local suppliers to create a delicious menu for the people of St. Thomas and Exeter.

Situated inside the café will also be a separate recording/music production studio which we hope will bring a great community of creatives together and encourage the local music and art scene.  

WHO?

Hi! We are Eddie and Jenn. Between us we have been working in the coffee and food industry for over 20 years and share a passion for good food, coffee and baking. Running events and pop ups together for three years we have always dreamt of owning a café and we finally feel like we have found a perfect space to do that.

Jenn has been working in food for over ten years and been running Eat my Food in Exeter since 2019 offering popups in independent venues across the city. Since the beginning of lock down she has been offering private catering, celebration cakes and a takeaway delivery service, as well as wholesaling bakes and buns to cafes in the local area. Jenn has loved cooking for everyone and getting to know you all over the past year, and now cannot wait to be cooking for you again in person in a permanent space.

Eddie has worked in specialty coffee for over tens years and is a passionate sourdough and pastry baker. He is also a musician, multi instrumentalist and music producer, performing live as the artist SVVIM around the UK, with frequent support from BBC introducing. He has been producing and writing for various local and further afar artists over the last 12 months. It has always been his dream to have a studio space to work from and to be able to combine his love of coffee/baking/cooking with his love for music couldn't get better.

We are so incredibly happy to have our own space where we can cook, bake and serve you delicious coffee.

WHAT? 

We are opening a bakery-café and creative space where we will be offering homemade pastries, sourdough bread, breakfast buns, cakes, specialty coffee, plus sit in breakfast and brunch. 

We will also be hosting evening feast nights and the space will be available for private hire, pop ups and workshops.

The breakfast and brunch menu will change with the seasons and there will be an emphasis on home made products. We are aiming to make everything we sell in house, from the bread we use to the ketchup we serve.

We will be using as much local, organic, free range (and where possible regenerative) produce that we can and there will be complete transparency given to the customer as to where our ingredients come from. Working closely with, and hand picking our suppliers means we will have extensive knowledge on every ingredient we serve.

There will be something for everyone; eggs, toast, vegan and gluten free, plus meat and fish options.

WHERE?

We have taken on a run-down old bookies in the heart of St Thomas (Exeter) and plan to transform it into a fantastic new venue. There will be an open kitchen so you can see us cooking and baking and big communal sharing tables for when you want to sit in. There is also a south facing space at the back which we will be turning into outside seating in the summer with homegrown vegetables and herbs which we will use in our dishes. It will be a dog (please bring your pups) and child friendly café. 

We cannot wait to be part of the community of St Thomas. This is going to be a huge project which we are going to be pouring a lot of time and love into and we hope you can be a part of it too.

The building needs gutting and we plan to do as much as we possibly can of the work ourselves. Being such a huge project the renovation is going to happen in three stages:

 Stage one we will open as a takeaway with some inside and window seating so you can sit and enjoy a coffee and pastry. The back of the space will be partitioned  whilst we refit the rest of the café. 

Stage two will be opening up with inside seating, cooking our breakfast and brunch menu to order and opening up our garden space for you to enjoy. 

Stage three will see the music studio being completed, plus us offering evening dinners and pop ups.

We can’t wait for you to all be able to see the space grow alongside us and we are reaching out and asking for the wonderful community of Exeter to help us achieve our goal.

We are offering a range of ways in which you can support us below and will be putting every penny into renovation and equipment to get us up and running.  

A few things you’ll be helping towards.

Coffee Equipment
A proper bakery oven

Kitchen equipment
Renovation (we need to get that tobacco stained, suspended ceiling down pronto!)
A counter and seating space for stage one of the project

 We would also like to say a huge thank you everyone who has supported us so far and all the wonderful people sending messages of encouragement. We wouldn't have even gotten this far without you.

Thank you! 

Eddie and Jenn

xxx

This project successfully funded on 10th July 2021