IT will be a ‘bittersweet farewell’ for shop bosses who are closing one store in the Lake District – and opening another in Kendal.

Food and drink company Lakeland Artisan will be shutting its Windermere shop this month due to the ‘huge increase’ in running costs, it has been announced.

Husband and wife team Geoff and Mary Monkman revealed online that it is 'no longer commercially viable' to renew the lease of their shop due to rising bills.

Lakeland Artisan in Bowness will remain open as usual.

The Windermere store will be closing for the final time on Wednesday February 15 after four years of trade.

Mr Monkman descried the closure as ‘bittersweet’ after revealing plans to open a site in Kendal’s Finkle Street in early March.

He said: “It will be hard to say goodbye but unfortunately the sums just didn’t add up.

“It’s bittersweet that as one shop closes another one is opening. We’re moving onwards and upward.”

The move will be Lakeland Artisan’s first permanent branch in Kendal after previously trading from pop-up shops.

The new store will open in the former Beales unit which has been empty since March 2020 after it went into administration.

The new owners began work on the site last year to convert the building into a space for local independent retailers and a food hall full of Cumbrian based eateries, an area for creative organisations as well as a number of flats and renovated cottages.

READ MORE: New owners of Kendal's former Beales store reveal plans

Mr Monkman said: “We heard about this shop becoming available and thought maybe we should keep a shop full time in Kendal since we’re based here.

“We decided to do this at the same time our landlord for the Windermere store said the rent would be going up by 28 per cent.

“We thought we can’t afford this. We thought we could move staff from Windermere to Kendal so we could keep all of them on.”

Lakeland Artisan sells a range of local products which champion the Cumbria area.

Mr Monkman said: “We try and source everything locally, we make 75 per cent of stuff in the shop and get the rest from independent producers in the local area.

“We try to help small companies fighting for a living.”