NORTH HAMPTON The news hit hard this week: The Urban Farmhouse Eatery is closing, leaving the community without one of its favorite gathering spots for food and comfort.
With a post on the restaurant’s Facebook page last week, owner Renee Locke explained that when she opened four and a half years ago, she hung a sign reading “Enter as strangers, leave as friends.” The sign would “shape who we became,” Locke wrote, making them grateful to be invited to be part of the lives of the community and those who patronized the Route 1 breakfast and lunch restaurant.
“Bearing witness to your traditions, your milestones, your successes and your growing families are just some of the reasons this is such a difficult post to write,” Locke stated.
Monadnock Ledger-Transcript
Published: 12/23/2020 3:37:09 PM
Although there are ways for the seven cabins at the Walden Eco Village to get into compliance, former casita (or tiny house) resident Quinn Kelley acknowledged there was very little hope that he’d be able to return to his 140-square-foot rental. The nine similar rentals on site were not permitted, and don’t meet several criteria of the town’s building code for residences, including the 400-square-foot minimum for studio or one-bedroom residences. Casita renters paid about $445 a month to rent small rooms with propane heat and electricity, and used a communal building on site for kitchen, bathroom, shower, and laundry facilities. Officials disconnected the propane and electricity to all casitas last Wednesday after witnessing several safety hazards.