From barn to bar, Pembroke City Limits, finally, opens to the public

PEMBROKE, NH – When I initially wrote about the inception of Pembroke City Limits, a new tavern in the Suncook Village of Pembroke, Rob Azevedo, the co-owner and iconic promoter of everyone and everything on the Southern New Hampshire arts scene, guaranteed that the tavern would open by June 1.

That didn’t happen.

“The delays were the most difficult part,” said Azevedo, who had no previous experience owning a restaurant. “There were contracting delays and oversights on my end, oversights on some regulations that needed to be corrected.”

Finally, on Wednesday, July 10, Pembroke City Limits opened its doors to a packed crowd as The Danny Savage Band provided acoustic, folky Americana tunes on a balmy summer evening.

Azevedo called it a “soft opening,” but his co-owner Eric Klesper, thrilled by the turnout, begged to differ.

“A soft opening is supposed to be by invite only, then Rob and Kelly-Sue [Leblanc, of the award-winning Sleazy Vegan who runs the kitchen at the Pembroke City Limits] posted it on social media,” said Klesper. “Oh well. This is great.”

The “official” grand opening of Pembroke City Limits, however, will happen on Saturday, July 13, when the restaurant starts serving the general public at 2 p.m.

The building itself—which was once an ice cream shop, a pharmacy and, most recently, a used furniture store, before being abandoned—set in the heart of the historic Suncook Village, was gutted and renovated in four and a half months by the impressive efforts of local Pembroke contractors.

While maintaining the original hardwood floors and its quaint brick exterior, Pembroke City Limits modernized the place with a pristine new bar, a functional open-concept kitchen for Leblanc and, of course, a stage for the performers.

Azevedo’s vision was to recreate what he had created in the barn of his Pembroke home. After moving from Manchester to the comparatively sleepy town of Pembroke in 2021, he took the 19th-Century barn of the house he owns with his wife, Julie, and made it a venue for local musicians and music-lovers to play and hang.

Azevedo said that he wants to give the artists performing at Pembroke City Limits full creative license to make their own shows, something that they might not get at other venues.

“I’m telling the musicians that this is your stage. You have the license to do anything you want,” said Azevedo, who continues to cull performers from “Granite State of Mind,” the radio program he hosts on Friday nights on WMNH 93.5 FM.

He also doesn’t want to limit the performances to music. Azevedo wants to host poetry readings, author appearances, stand-up comedy and anything that might promote an arts scene in the region. He said he is even applying for grants so artists can host workshops and other creative gatherings.

But Pembroke City Limits is not about bottom lines, said Azevedo, who will continue to work a day job.

“I didn’t get into this to be in the bar and restaurant business,” he said. “I got into this to be in the community business, right here in Suncook Village. I don’t have any delusions of grandeur. This is about doing exactly what I did in my barn, except now I actually have to sell food and beer.”

In a society that seems to be moving away from community bars and restaurants in favor of profit and acclaim, Azevedo is going the other way. “This is, straight-up, a neighborhood bar,” he said.

For that, the people of Pembroke are richer, and others in the area—those of us in Manchester or Concord, or any and everywhere else in between—may also have some new grounds to stake.

You can find the menu, business hours and future events at The Pembroke City Limits Facebook page here.