Cake & Bake, Newstead shuts down with cult owner to provide to a ‘handful of private clients’

An inner-city bakery that’s forged a near-decade long legacy and attracted a loyal legion of customers has quietly closed its doors.

A cult Brisbane bakeery has quietly closed the doors of its inner-city shop, leaving customers searching for answers.

Jocelyn Hancock has made the shock decision to close her beloved Cake & Bake store at Newstead.

Ms Hancock is the previous owner of the iconic Jocelyn’s Provisions in New Farm.

Her Cake & Bake business started in West End in 2015 before it moved to the Commerical Rd in Newstead in April 2018.

In a note to customers on the window of its now empty shopfront, Ms Hancock wrote: “Dear friends of Cake & Bake. We have closed, thanks for your support 2015 - 2023.”

Cake & Bake has closed its shop front in Newstead. Photo: Tayla Couacaud

“I am not working anymore, I have made the decision for myself and have no plans to re-open,” Ms Hancock told The Courier Mail.

“I have lots of different reasons to close my businesses. I did close it at the end beginning of February, so four months ago.

“There is ups and downs and lots of different things in small businesses. [But] I loved to bake and love doing what I did.”

Jocelyn Hancock, owner of the now closed Cake & Bake at Newstead. Picture: File

Customer still looking to get their hands on one of Ms Hancock’s delicious and handmade cakes, will be left without as she now only provides for a “handful of private clients”.

Ms Hancock has previously told the Courier Mail, baking had been a lifelong love.

“I started JP’s because I could see there was that potential for retail — there was a need for it,” she said in 2019.

Jocelyn Hancock is the beloved baker/owner of Cake & Bake and said it was “her decision to close” the bakery. Picture: File

“I was working at Yungaba (she leased the kitchen at historic Yungaba House, Kangaroo Point) in wholesale and I had this little vestibule where people would walk in off the back step to a couple of racks I had put up there.

Ms Hancock's legacy still lives on through Jocelyn’s Provisions which has became a Brisbane institution, known for its “real” cakes and desserts.

A spokeswoman for Jocelyn Provisions said “they have traded for 16 years, and have grown to four retail stores”.

“Jocelyn Hancock sold Jocelyn’s Provisions in 2008. She has had no connection to the business since that time,” she said.

Some of the sweat treats at the iconic Cake & Bake.

“She later opened Cake and Bake at West End which closed and moved to Newstead which never reopened after Christmas.

“We have traded as Jocelyn’s Provisions for 16 years and have grown the business to four retail stores and substantial wholesale customers and we continue to trade well and grow our business.”

Jocelyn’s finely-honed baking skills and her clean-eating ethos are the result of a childhood spent on her family farm in Killarney, about 35km west of Warwick, and now intends to spend more time at the farm.

“I spend more time in Killarney, and have commuted between for the last 20 years,” she said.

Originally published as Cake & Bake, Newstead shuts down with cult owner to provide to a ‘handful of private clients’