Llan Calender Girls become magazine cover girls

* The magazine's front cover featuring the Calendar Girls.

LLANGOLLEN’S Calendar Girls have become cover girls after being featured in a magazine spread.

The December edition of Border Life includes an article on the Valley Girls WI who have produced a 2016 calendar copies of which they are selling to raise £1,000 to be divided between Nightingale House and Hope House hospices.

The story is also showcased on the magazine’s front cover.

Instead of posing nude like their counterparts in Yorkshire a few years ago, members of the area’s newest branch of the Women’s Institute donned a range of colourful period costumes to appear alongside some famous local landmarks in their calendar.

Llangollen-based professional photographer Kim Price Evans, who took the dozen atmospheric images for the calendar, revealed that although her fellow members kept fully clothed for her shoots, the project did stem from a saucy burlesque workshop she and friend Julie Thomas, who are both accomplished dancers, did for the Valley Girls earlier this year.   * The article inside the magazine.

She said: “We went along to a meeting to do the workshop and the idea of doing a calendar came from that.

“We wanted to create something a bit different, so we decided on a calendar showing famous spots in Llangollen including the heritage railway, the Motor Museum, the Chain Bridge, Plas Newydd, Valle Crucis Abbey, the canal and wharf and the International Pavilion.

“We had members posing in each scene and we reckon we have them wearing costumes depicting most of the decades of the 20^th century, which is appropriate as the WI is celebrating its centenary this year.

“The whole thing began in the spring and has taken quite a few months to complete but it was a lot of fun to do.”         

Valley Girls WI was founded in 2013 by a small group of local thirty-somethings who shared a passion for baking, crafting and socialising.

Its president, Gail Ellson, said: “We have a target of raising at least £1,000 from sales of the calendar which will be split equally between our two local hospices.

“But, apart from supporting these great charities, we also want the calendar to be used as a tool to help market Llangollen.

“We’d like to see businesses buying a stock to distribute to their customers and people using them as Christmas or birthday presents for their friends and family.”

* Copies of the calendar are available at various outlets in town, via Valley Girls’ website at www.valleygirlswi.co.uk, or by emailing: valleygirlswi@outlook.com