The Barn House
Each Sunday, we're sharing a small bright spot from the previous edition of The Weekender
There are plenty of places around Clayton where you can buy produce.
There are considerably fewer places where the person selling it to you can probably tell you what farm it came from, when it was picked and who grew it.
That’s more or less the idea behind The Barn House, the little roadside market on Barber Mill Road run by Alison Mitchiner Kilpatrick and her family.
And the “barn” part isn’t branding.
The building was originally constructed in the early 1920s as the horse and mule barn for Alison’s great-grandfather, Henry Herman Vinson. More than a century later, the original brick walls and wood beams are still there.
So is the family.
Alison’s generation is the 11th generation to work and farm the family’s land. The Vinson farm has traditionally grown tobacco and soybeans, along with watermelons in the summer and pecans harvested from trees on the property.
The idea behind The Barn House? Make it easier for people around Clayton to buy genuinely local food directly from the people growing it.
“We started with a vision to bring only local, fresh produce from local farmers to our community,” Alison told me. “We work direct with the farmers to bring seasonal, nutrient-dense produce to our area.”
And they take the “local” part pretty seriously.
On Wednesdays and Thursdays, much of the day is spent driving around eastern and central North Carolina picking up what will be sold that weekend: apples and peaches from Eagle Springs, green peanuts from Pinetops, field peas and butter beans from Lucama, corn from Clayton, Kenly and Lucama, and okra and potatoes from Benson.
The difference, Alison says, is that local produce gets the opportunity to actually ripen before it’s picked.
“That’s why strawberries and watermelons, tomatoes, etc. are so much better local,” she said. “They have time to ripen naturally.”
Produce is only part of what has gradually filled the shelves.
The Barn House also carries sourdough products made by Alison’s aunt, Valerie Dupree, seasonal cobblers, pimento cheese, pickles, local honey, Vinson Farm eggs and products from Clayton Peanut Company, a business started by Alison’s sons. That includes praline pecans, blistered salted peanuts and chocolate-covered peanuts.
And on Saturdays, there are fresh boiled peanuts.
The Barn House is still, as Alison describes it, a small roadside market.
But she sees a bigger purpose for it.
“Farmers are struggling right now,” she said. “We want to show them support. We want people to be able to buy direct from a farmer. Most people just don’t know how. We are trying to make that possible.”
The market will add local pumpkins beginning around September 10, followed by North Carolina Christmas trees toward the end of November.
For now, The Barn House is open Fridays and Saturdays from 9am–5pm.
It’s a hundred-year-old mule barn, sitting on land the same family has farmed for generations, now being used to connect a rapidly growing Clayton with the farms that have been here all along.
The Barn House is located at 3268 Barber Mill Road, just a few minutes south of Downtown Clayton. The market is open Fridays and Saturdays from 9am–5pm. Follow along on Facebook for updates and events.
Become a Paid Clayton Dispatch Member
$5 per month or $50 per year Membership helps support independent local reporting, expand coverage, and pay for future Dispatch upgrades.
Members receive:
- The ability to comment on Dispatch stories
- Priority question submissions for the upcoming Council Watch-Along with Dan podcast
- Regular behind-the-scenes reporting notes and project updates
- Member discounts and early access to Clayton Dispatch merch
- An exclusive Clayton Dispatch sticker for monthly members*
- An exclusive Clayton Dispatch tote bag for annual members.
The actual reporting will remain available to everyone. Paid membership helps make more of it possible.
Also, this can get us a whole lot closer to a print edition.
*Stickers will be given out every quarter.
