A felled tree that stood in Biggleswade for hundreds of years has been given a new lease of life. The beech tree, thought to be around 250 years old, stood in the car park of Motley & Hope solicitors on Shortmead Street. But last summer it was diagnosed with a fungal disease after losing all it leaves, and had to be cut down.

Practice Manager, Ian Randall, said: "We had a representative from the council confirm it was dead and it had to come down. But the Partners wanted to keep some of it, they weren't sure what they were going to do with it at the time."

The tree surgeon put Mr Randall in touch with two chainsaw carvers Leigh Sherlock and Stuart Tomson. He sent them some photos of the piece of wood that had been saved, and they created the new bench, which now stands on the lawn outside the office.

Mr Randall added: "It's a work of art, everyone was really quite pleased with it. It is now sitting on the lawn very close to where the original tree was and they tell us it should last as long as the tree did. It's a permanent memento of the tree, which is what we really wanted when we kept some of the tree back."