CINDERFORD flower arranging specialist Alwyn Page has landed her first international award by coming third in the World Floramondi Show in Glasgow.
During her career as a teacher and floral artist she has won many awards including two first at national shows, but this caps the lot.
The Floramondi is a triennial event and this year it featured 300 floral artist from 27 countries.
"It was an honour just to take part but to actually win a prize was fantastic," she said.
Her award was for an entry in the class entitled Sunbeams Dancing in the Wind, which she depicted with artichoke seed heads and gold beads dancing in a tree of twisted willow.
The inspiration came after she dropped an artichoke head, sending its seeds dancing round her workshop!
As well as teaching floristry at the Royal Forest of Dean College, Alwyn gives demonstrations at flower clubs in England and Wales.
She also runs classes at her studio for local people wishing to learn the gentle and relaxing art of flower arranging, but says competition work is far from relaxing – it took her six hours of painstaking work to stage her winning piece.
It is more than six feet tall, and she has recreated it in her shop for all to see for the next two weeks.
She says she intends to go on competing and is hoping to go to the next World Show in Japan in 2005.