VILLAGE shops are special. More than just a place to buy a loaf of bread or a stamp, a village shop helps create a community - and not just because you can gather all the gossip. And one that opens today is more special than most, a real community venture.

Villagers at Middleton Tyas near Richmond don't just use the shop - they own it. More than 100 residents chipped in at least £25 each to get the shop started when the previous village shop closed. And what's more, it's helped save the village hall.

"The enthusiasm for a new shop was tremendous," says Jill McMullon, a founder member. "We needed £70,00 and raised over £15,000 in the village in a very short space of time."

The first problem - apart from the money - was where to put the shop. Because the previous village shop had been converted back to a house and sold, the committee had to find new premises.

"Coincidentally, the village hall - the Memorial Hall - was under threat of closure as the trustees had had been asked to sell it to provide a new community room in the new school being built in the village. But the Memorial Hall trustees decided not to sell so we were able to site a new shop in part of the hall."

But until the new school was built, the children still had their meals in the village hall. And part of what would be the shop was the kitchen so the conversion had to wait awhile...

As a start, they were able to clear out a small area that had been used for storage and build a post office, small but perfectly formed, which opened last year run by postmistress Dorothy Logan.

In the spirit of self-help, villagers also started selling newspapers from the hall, with volunteers taking it in turns every morning. Saturdays were social occasions - coffee and a chance to chat. There were displays of photos and hobbies.

"It was a really good way of getting to know people you might not have met otherwise," says Jill.

The shop has grants and help from DEFRA, The Countryside Agency, Richmondshire District Council, VERSA and Moto Services - their neighbours at the Scotch Corner end of the village. The shareholders form an Industrial Provident Society, with an elected committee of seven members. Any profit goes not into shareholders' pockets but must go back into the community.

When the school moved out of the Memorial Hall at Easter, work, largely by village builder Billy Williams, began in earnest on the new shop - now very smart. Again what to sell and when to sell it were community decisions - a survey went to shareholders asking everyone what they would like to buy in their new shop, when they would like it to be open.

"Apart from basics, the thing everyone was very keen on was to have local products, so we have local eggs, cheese and bacon, jams and chutneys from down the road, Brymor ice cream, and hope to have even more."

There's even a delivery van.

"Many elderly residents can't cope with a lot of shopping and we have people in outlying farms and down in Moulton so we want this shop to be a real service for them."

The shop looks smashing, all very smart - right down to the posh wicker baskets.

"We wanted to give the village the very best shop we could and I hope we've done that."

l Middleton Tyas Village shop will be opened at 3pm today by William Hague.

NEVER argue with a WI member when she's got a pickaxe in her hand... The area in front of the new village shop has been a bit of a jungle for years. Then after the new village shop was created, it was piled high with builders' rubble. Not a pretty sight. And that's how it looked three weeks ago.

But then Middleton Tyas WI took the job on...

In just that short time, they planned the garden, raised the money, cleared the site, laid paving stones, lugged cobbles - with just a little help from a few husbands. "It's been brilliant," says Middleton Tyas WI President Daphne Carter. "All sorts of people have helped, given money and made us tea while we've been working."

When the WI took the project on, member and garden designer Lindsay Deeble drew up the plans. "But first we knew we would need lots of money so we did that great WI stand by and had a cake stall," says Daphne.

They expected members to make a cake each. "But they were staggering in with trays full. Many of our members are, shall we say a bit older, so knew they couldn't dig or mix concrete or do the heavy work, but they really rallied round with the baking.

"Then other people gave us some very generous cheques. Ravensworth Nursery gave us a generous discount on plants. People have stopped and chatted and given us money. Other people have given us an hour or two of their time. But it's all helped. It's been really good, a real team effort."

Lindsay designed the garden to be low maintenance - the WI have taken it on as permanent project - and to be a meeting place where people can sit and chat. It's wheelchair and pushchair friendly, a lavender hedge leads to a bench, with a view of the village green and there's a wealth of flowers to attract butterflies.

WI members went to local quarries to get cobbles and gravel. Only the WI could collect stones in a Calvin Klein bag... and gave rise to a whole new system of measurement. Not to ruin the suspension on their cars, bags of stones could be no more than "one fat lady". Barrow loads of cement came in standard and "lady barrow" size.

"It's been a lot of hard physical work. People have been a bit surprised to see us with pickaxes and cement mixers. A lot of men think that women can't do things like this. But I think we might just have proved them wrong."