SUMMER has come early for postmistress Maxine Raine.
Maxine has packed her post office at St John's Chapel, in Weardale, with every variety of silk flower she could find.
Customers were stunned by the mass of colour on display.
But it has been good for business.
"I suppose some people may have thought it a bit of a daft idea trying to sell flowers in the kind of winter we have experienced here in the dale," said Maxine, who made headlines in The Northern Echo last year by opening a Santa's grotto in the middle of summer
"But it seems to have cheered folk up," she said.
"With the way businesses are going in the dale at the moment and the number of post offices that are being forced to close, you have to come up with fresh ideas."
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