One of the things I love most about this property is how it continues to reveal its history little by little, like a good story told in chapters. When we bought the once Howland-Gould General Store in 2022, we knew it had once been a general store, and we soon learned about its curious turn as a teahouse. But one detail really captured our imaginations: one set of the stone steps leading up from the road didn’t go to the store at all — it led to Hope’s volunteer fire department.

At the heart of many New England villages sits a general store — a place where commerce, community, and conversation wove together the rhythm of daily life. In Hope, Rhode Island, that place was the Howland-Gould General Store. Nearly 200 years later, the building still stands proudly, a granite-and-timber witness to generations of farmers, millworkers, and neighbors who once passed through its doors.