AN arts centre giving North Yorkshire's leading craftspeople the chance to showcase their work is to open next month.

The venue, at Thornton-le-Dale, near Pickering, has been designed to allow businesses and artists to have their work displayed and sold.

It is being opened with funding and support from North Yorkshire County Council, and officials are confident it will prove a success with residents and tourists.

Jeremy Wright, of the authority's economic development unit, said the provisional opening date was Sunday, April 1, but that could be affected by the foot-and-mouth crisis.

He said: "The building was owned by a private company which ceased trading at the end of last year. We had been looking for somewhere like this to open an arts centre and Thornton-le-Dale seemed the ideal location.

"It will obviously get a lot of trade from local residents, but it will hopefully benefit from the large number of tourists who visit the town. The only other centre like this in North Yorkshire is in Settle.

"Money that we take from having the centre open will be put towards the running costs and rent, so it will be a completely independent concern."

Traders signing up for the scheme will be able to display furniture, paintings, wood crafts and textiles.

Mr Wright added: "There are a number of businesses from North Yorkshire who have signed up to the scheme and will have some of their products shown.

"But we are going to have a section in the centre devoted to smaller individual artists on a rotation basis. The artists who choose to display will change every few weeks or so.

"Hopefully this will be a great asset both for the North Yorkshire artists and businesses which use the centre, but also for Thornton-le-Dale.

"We are hoping to expand the scheme eventually to include artists from across the Yorkshire area who will benefit from having their work displayed."

The centre is undergoing a major refurbishment in time for the proposed opening.