Renovation work begins at Brooker T’s Café in Uptown Lexington
“From the Ashes We Will Rise” proclaims the Facebook page of Brooker T’s Café in Uptown Lexington.
This week that proclamation is coming true as extensive renovations are underway starting with the construction of an exterior wood safety wall around the building at 103 South Main Street.
Davidson County builder Jason Hedrick of Hedrick Creative Building and PuroClean were hired to clean up the building and begin the rebuilding process.
Brooker T’s Café suffered a serious fire in September 2022, just four months after mother-daughter duo Tammy Cornell and Brooke Bishop opened the restaurant in the space formerly occupied by Café 35.
They had purchased the popular business from Linda and Mark Gosselin, who had operated the restaurant for 17 years but wanted to retire.
Bishop said the plan has always been to reopen but the extensive interior damage slowed down the rebuilding process.
“Insurance was not the issue,” she said. “There was just so much structural damage our structural engineer wanted to make sure it was sound and up to code before we could go forward.” Bishop said she and her mother and the building’s owner, Mike Turlington, will be looking at various options and cost estimates before any interior architectural plans are finalized.
“But I can tell you everything in the restaurant is going to be completely different,” she said of the interior design. “We are literally starting from scratch.”
Bishop said she does not have a timeline yet for the reopening but she is looking forward to getting back to uptown Lexington and the regular customer base they had built up over four months.
Bishop and her mother, both veterans of the service industry, have been working in other restaurants since the devastating fire.
She is working at East Coast Wings in Salisbury while Cornell is working at LouLou’s Waterfront restaurant (which recently changed ownership) near Holden Beach, where she has a home.
But Bishop said they’re both ready to return to their dream business. “Absolutely, that has not changed,” she said. It would appear the community is ready for their return.
{Photos By: Vikki Broughton Hodges/Davidson Local}
When a photo was posted late Tuesday afternoon on their Facebook page of the security wall being put up, more than 100 people immediately “liked” the post and around 60 “loved” it.
