AN APPEAL is being made for skilled carpet workers to take over from 80-year-old Margaret Salter as demonstrators at Kidderminster's Weavers Loft.

Mrs Salter, who started working in the industry at the age of 14, has been showing visitors how skilled pickers can spot and invisibly repair faults in the weave for the last three years.

Her son, Jonathan Salter, who manages the loft, run by the Friends of the Carpet Museum Trust in New Meeting Church, Church Street, said she was happy to help out sometimes but felt the commitment of every other Saturday morning was "getting a bit too much".

He is now on the hunt for more volunteers to work on a rota basis with the loft's remaining skilled picker, Lyn Walker.

"It would be great to have a few people - the more the merrier - and then we could work out a rota," said Mr Salter.

Anyone who can spare a Saturday morning from 10am to 12.30pm at least once a month should call him on 01562 863659.

Meanwhile, local carpet industry historian, author and chairman of the Friends of the Carpet Museum Trust, Melvyn Thompson, will be leading walks on Saturday and on Saturday, August 20 through Kidderminster looking at significant sites and buildings that tell the story of the town's carpet industry.

The walks start at 11am from the Weaver's Loft.