The Barn Coffee & Social House
The Barn Coffee & Social House
Charming Coffee Hotspot in Mahone Bay
BY LAURA OAKLEY
PHOTOS MICHELLE DOUCETTE
“What was a draw for us was to create a community,” says Amelia Bishop of opening The Barn Coffee & Social House. After years of getting quietly talked into launching a business in Mahone Bay, she and her husband, Mike Bishop, took the leap and signed a lease for a building that was once just a simple horse barn. The next step—is to transform it into a place not just for grabbing coffee but a space where friends, families, co-workers and everyone in between feel comfortable getting together; a second home of sorts.
“We had a connection with friends of ours, who ended up buying [the entire property]. They weren’t really sure what to do with it.” Says Mike Bishop. The building is part of a bigger property that includes Suttles & Seawinds, a fashion and décor boutique made famous for its quilts, housed in a grand heritage property. The shop has been in business since 1973, and the barn building was that property’s former horse barn or carriage house. The property owners turned down dozens of requests to take over the barn but were holding out for their friends—the Bishops—to agree to make their coffee house dream become a reality when the timing was right.
“Mike loved coffee shops, and I loved coffee shops,” says Amelia. “We both had a connection to The Coffee Merchant in Wolfville, we both went there at different times, throughout our years at Acadia.” Growing up in the Annapolis Valley, Amelia has an early memory of helping out at that same coffee shop as a kid. “I remember having a pair of overalls on and I was helping mop the floor,” says Amelia. “As a child, I saw that this was a special thing that the community had. It can be a pull for the community to connect in that day-to-day routine.”
The Bishops first relocated to the Mahone Bay area while running their previous business, Helen B’s Preserves, built on Mike’s mother’s hobby business. “When we moved here, we started looking around,” says Mike, for “the spot that’s going to be our spot.” But they didn’t feel connected with anywhere in particular and thought the community could use a hub, ideally a coffee shop. But they weren’t ready just yet. They were still developing the Helen B’s brand and learning how to run a business.
During the summer of 2016, they tried running a business in Mahone Bay. “The opportunity presented itself to open a pop-up store. So we did. And with whom we partnered up at the time, Acadian Maple, we decided to see what it would be like to have a retail location in Mahone Bay,” says Amelia. “The owners of the barn property came back and said they were getting ready to do some major leasehold improvements,” says Amelia. They invited the couple to look at the changes they wanted to make and asked them to help “bring some life into the space” by finally opening the coffee shop they’d dreamed about for years.
In August 2016, they signed the lease for the building, made some renos, then opened The Barn Coffee & Social House in February 2017. “It was a major leap of faith,” says Amelia. “We thought we’d be driving around knocking on doors—hey, we’re the new coffee shop in town. Do you want to check it out? But people were so curious after walking by and seeing the transformation. We were really lucky and blessed to have that location.”
The Barn quickly earned a long list of loyal customers and became a staple in the community—just what the Bishops had envisioned. The space, still in many ways just a barn, is the perfect blend of rustic country charm and comfort. “Aside from that we had to add drywall and electrical; we really tried to keep it essentially as it was,” says Mike. The interior boasts original wood floors and rafters juxtaposed against clean white walls. The furniture is a mix of antique pieces, long wooden tables intended for groups, and big, soft chairs and couches with throw pillows. There are carefully curated retail items throughout the main floor, along with the coffee bar and pastry displays (where gooey cinnamon buns and doughnuts attract much attention). The upstairs is a gathering place with ample seating and vintage decor. There are kitschy, fun vintage signs throughout the space.
“People treasured the building, and it was important for us in getting that dream to work and going ahead with it was to preserve the story of the building,” says Amelia. “So the name The Barn just kind of sunk in for us.” Given the importance of history in a town like Mahone Bay, the couple wanted to keep as many of the original qualities of the barn intact as possible. “We had a customer tell us his grandfather used to park the horse in the barn when he went to church, that same barn,” says Mike.
As with most recent tales, this thriving business had to change pace and directions quickly once the pandemic hit. Luckily for the Bishops, coffee and pastries lent well to takeout, and they didn’t have to close even for one day. But they had to reflect on what they could do differently. “That time really forced us to make some difficult decisions,” says Amelia. Specifically, after dipping their toe in the coffee bean roasting process in late 2019 following the purchase of their roaster, they dove right into it when the pandemic started and had to cut ties with suppliers who had first helped them get on their feet. “We had partnered up with North Mountain Coffee roasters and love those guys, they helped us get our start and training tips on espresso, and we are forever grateful to them for helping us get going,” says Amelia. Roasting coffee beans in their garage, and building a full bakery in the basement of The Barn building, were just a couple of changes to the business during the most challenging parts of the pandemic. (They now have commercial kitchen equipment and a legit baker.)
Amelia and Mike Bishop
Sunday Silence Coffee, the Bishops’ whole bean business, has grown, along with The Barn brand. Not only do they supply their locations—the flagship in Mahone Bay, a seasonal seaside coffee kiosk in Lunenburg, and their one-year-old Bridgewater expansion—they sell to about 60 retailers and have online sales, as well. But that was never really part of the original plan.
“It was always part of a vision that we had to be part of a community and create space, and an experience where people can come in and feel like they have that third place. That connection point with their friends and family,” says Amelia. It seems like they have done just that. The Barn Coffee & Social House is open daily on 458 Main Street in Mahone Bay from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.
