But as one Garstang Bloom committee member says, Garstang's success blossomed long before the awards started rolling in.

One of their finest hours came on Friday night when the town won the highest Gold of the Entente Florale 2008.

Lyn Harter has been a member of the Bloom committee for several years and says: "The rest of Europe will now know what Garstang has known all along – that Garstang was always a winner."

"To win EF we have not had to do an awful lot more than we already do, except that the committee have been more involved. The community were already close knit but they have become closer still.

"We were so pleased that people did come on board, that we got through to people that it was more than just a few women putting up flowers.

"We have done the town proud and I think it will benefit the town and help bring in more visitors."

Although Lyn says that it has been a "mammoth effort" to get it all together, she knows that the success has been built over many years of hard work by not just the committee but also many volunteers.

"For years and years Nora Hoyles and Lyn Nixon put out baskets on the High Street and then worked with a dedicated team of 'bloomers'."

Nora Hoyles, Bloom chairman, dates the start of Garstang's glory run to their first entry in the Britain in Bloom competition 22 year ago.

She says: "It was when the town council and the Chamber of Trade came together and started bringing Britain in Bloom to Garstang. Prior to that, people put up hanging baskets. Then the shopkeepers, the Chamber of Trade and the Town Trust all pulled together.

"It has been an amazing journey when I think of where we were and where we are now."

Read the rest of this feature in Tuesday night's Lancashire Evening Post.

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