KENDAL could soon have its own food hall with a dozen street food vendors.

Last Saturday, the owners of Lancaster-based Dam Good Coffee Shop announced they had purchased the former Provincial insurance hall, attached to Sand Aire House at the corner of New Road and Stramongate.

And husband and wife team Warren and Lesley Hartley plan to spend £250,000 turning the Grade II listed building into a 'DamGood Food Hall' accompanied by a coffee bar and micro pub, all with a 'stripped-back' design.

"I'm wanting to bring everything back to bare bricks and expose all the features of the building," said Mr Hartley, 35, who grew up in Kendal.

"I want to keep it all industrial, let the building do the talking."

Mr and Mrs Hartley set up Dam Good Coffee Shop on Lancaster's Penny Street around two years ago. It is a cafe with a twist, as its coffee and cakes come in cannabidiol-infused varieties as well as plain.

Cannabidiol (CBD) is a chemical compound derived from cannabis. According to Which? it is "anecdotally popular for conditions such as anxiety, chronic pain and insomnia."

It does not produce the psychoactive effects of THC, another cannabis compound, and CBD products can be sold legally in the UK.

Mr Hartley said, prior to setting up the coffee shop in Lancaster, his wife had suffered problems with Fibromyalgia for a long time, with symptoms including back pain and fatigue.

He said a friend visiting from Los Angeles gave Lesley a CBD gummy sweet and "within 10, 15 minutes her pain had gone".

The pair researched CBD, Mr Hartley visited Amsterdam to learn more and, before they knew it, the idea of a CBD-inspired cafe, which started out "as a bit of a joke" between them, had become a reality.

"It's brought my wife out of misery so I want to spread the word and help other people do it," he said.

"It's giving people their lives back. The first couple of weeks we opened we had a couple of customers coming back saying 'I just wanted to nip in and say thank-you.'"

Indeed, the plan is for the Kendal micro pub to serve CBD-infused drinks, and Mr Hartley is hoping to have CBD products sold in the food hall.

The pair are currently readying an application to South Lakeland District Council and hope to have the hall opened in three to six months.