EAST Lancashire is celebrating a variety of horticultural success stories as part of a regional awards ceremony.

Blackburn, Whalley, Barnoldswick, Colne and Chorley picked up prizes at the Britain in Bloom North West awards.

The Blackburn town centre partnership picked up Town Centre of the Year and a Britain in Bloom Gold award at the ceremony last week.

Executive member for environment, Cllr Jim Smith, said: “It is testament to the hard work of everyone involved in making our town centre look as fantastic as it does.

“Having an attractive and vibrant town centre is vital for us to be able to attract visitors, shoppers and residents to visit Blackburn.”

Whalley in Bloom won the Community Effort prize and were also named overall winners in the Best Small Town category after picking up a gold medal.

Subsequently it has been nominated for the best small town for the national Britain in Bloom 2018 awards.

A spokesman for the group said: “Thanks so much to everyone who helped us achieve this, the award is for all who helped us make Whalley bloom in 2017.

“Here’s to much more pulling together and beautifying Whalley next year.”

Barnoldswick in Bloom picked up the ‘Clean Sweep Award’ for its clean-up work in the area and also won a gold award in the ‘Best Town’ section.

Colne in Bloom picked up a gold medal in the Best Large Town section and The Crown Hotel in Colne also picked up a silver medal for best small accommodation category

Chorley in Bloom won a gold medal in the best small city category, while the Mormon Church in the town was ‘highly commended’ for its efforts.

The awards took at place at the Southport Theatre and Convention Centre.

The regional awards celebrations for Blackburn and Barnoldswick followed their success in the national competition when they picked up gold and silver awards respectively.