A DURHAM City pub returned to its former glory over the Jubilee weekend when it reopened its doors after two long years of closure.
The Woodman Inn on Gilesgate has sat empty and without owners since 2019 – despite always traditionally being a popular destination for pub-goers in the historic city.
Determined not letting the pub go to rack and ruin, local business owners, Andrew Ward, and husband and wife Douglas and Gemma McCarroll hatched a plan to give the pub a new lease of life to give the pub back to Durham.
Read more: Durham City's The Woodman Inn pub to reopen next week
During the last 12 months, the team have set about renovating the building, to make it a “friendly and community-driven” place to go for residents and visitors.
This included creating a beer garden, making it a dog-friendly and family-friendly venue, designing a central fireplace, putting a pool table in, and setting the wheels in motion to hold coffee mornings and quiz nights.
Now that the work has been complete, the grand reopening took place on Thursday (June 2) with a Jubilee-type celebration.
Take a look inside The Woodman Inn:
Pictures: GEMMA MCCARROLL.
Speaking about the reopening of The Woodman Inn, co-owner of the venture, Gemma McCarroll, said: “We always thought it was a great pub, but some of the previous owners maybe hadn’t run it the best. We quickly set out to renovate it and give it a new lease of life.
“We want to introduce a friendly and community driven space to hold coffee mornings, quiz nights, make it the place that people can get cosy and enjoy some drinks or to just pop for one drink on the way to somewhere else.”
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