York's Black Swan in Peasholme Green has become the latest local organisation to fly the flag for our Proud to be York campaign.

The pub, which won the inner city pub section of last year's York in Bloom competition with its colourful hanging baskets, has signed up to our crusade to make York a more bright and colourful place all the year round.

And with the York in Bloom laurel already under its belt, this year it is concentrating on what lies out of sight behind the building.

The managers thought that an unattractive car park spoiled the image of the otherwise charming 16th century building which sits just inside the city walls - so they plan to transform it into a flower-filled beer garden instead.

Assistant manager Nicki Doughty said: "We saw some of the pictures that were being shown in the Evening Press about how everything looked such a mess and when you look at our pub from the front it looks lovely.

"But the back is a bit of a mess and, obviously, we aim to improve it.

"We thought it would be good to have somewhere nice for people to sit."

New hanging baskets, tubs of flowers and low fences are on order and after permission has been gained from Bass for some of the changes the garden should take about two weeks to complete.

Let's just hope that the improvements meet the approval of the several ghosts which were disturbed last time renovations were carried out in the 1950s.

Perhaps the new garden will put a smile on the face of the "old gentleman" who is rumoured to sit at the end of the bar, looking none too happy.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.