Transformation for Barnstaple pub

THE owner of a local Chinese restaurant has taken over the North Country Inn on Mermaid Walk in Barnstaple.

Businessman James Li, who owns the Fullam restaurant in Tuly Street, plans to turn the Grade II-listed town centre pub into a cocktail bar and Asian restaurant.

Restoration work will probably take six months, Mr Li said.

The North Country Inn was one of the oldest pubs in Barnstaple when it closed its doors in spring this year. The pub company who owned it, Enterprise Inns, then put the building on the market.

The pub, which was already established by 1764, had been with a number of leaseholders and struggled to attract customers immediately before it closed.