BLACKWOOD is set to welcome a new business to town, and it is one that will have residents’ mouths watering.

Set to open next month, The House of Cake is hoping to do what it says on the tin – offering delicious cake options to customers.

Once open, the new café will be located on the High Street, in the heart of the town centre.

With a location near to the main throughfare to the car park, owner Adrian Turner hopes that the location will attract a great dealing of passing trade.

Failing that, the cakes being prepared in the shop window space will surely help.

Speaking to the Argus ahead of opening, Mr Turner said: “The plans have all come together in the last two weeks or so.

“It has always been an idea in the back of my mind, but I decided that now was the time to go through with it.

“On the one hand it will be a standard café. Selling your lattes, your cappuccinos and your regular coffees.

“But we’ll also be making and selling fresh cakes too. Our trained chef will be making the cakes from scratch in the window – and we’ll have a variety of options. Mainly cheesecakes, but some sponges too.

“It’ll be served by the slice, but we’ll also be looking to take orders for whole cakes too.”

Read more local news here

Putting Blackwood on the map

One word came up multiple times during Mr Turner’s conversation with the Argus – freshness.

Not only in terms of the products, which will almost entirely be made fresh in-store (the exception being gluten and nut free products, due to contamination risks preparing them in the same location).

In addition, there is a hope to breathe new life in the town, and give it something that neighbouring areas might be lacking.

He said: “Between 9-5 we’ll be a café, but in the evenings, we hope to be a community hub – offering book clubs, maybe monthly LGBT events, private hires, and so on.

“We really want to keep local people coming in. I’m from Blackwood, which is why I wanted to keep my investment here, and get people visiting Blackwood instead of Caerphilly or anywhere else.

“We’ll be looking to bring some local staff in too. We have our chef, and hopefully he’ll be able to help train the staff up, and maybe one day we’ll hopefully be able to turn the business into a franchise, looking at nearby towns before thinking about the bigger cities like Cardiff.

“We’ll be collecting the keys on December 1, and there’ll be a lot of work happening after that. But we’ll hopefully be opening before Christmas.”

More information will be available on The House of Cake Facebook page in the lead up to the opening.