THE Elms Hotel at Abberley has teamed up with the Countryside Service of Worcestershire County Council to recreate an orchard of traditional fruit varieties.

The hotel is undergoing an extensive refurbishment thatincludes the guest areas and bedrooms. It also has plans for a new function suite and spa.

A key part of this re-development is the renaming of the hotel's bedrooms using the fruit theme. A series of apple, pear and plum varieties local to Worcestershire have been chosen as the new names for each of the 21 bedrooms.

To mark National Tree Week, 18 trees were initally planted in the hotel grounds on Friday.

Old apple varieties such as Tupstones, Colwall Quoining and Green Purnell, along with the famous Worcester Black Pear, Pitmaston Duchess pear and the Apricot Gauge were chosen for the orchard.

It is hoped that in future years, fruit from the orchard will appear on the menu of the hotel's restaurant, which already prides itself on its extensive sourcing of the best local produce.

The Elms general manager Mark Green said: "We are extremely proud to be involved with a project that promotes awareness of the wealth of produce available to us in the county.

"Over the coming years, we hope to increase the size of the orchard to feature as many of the fruit varieties that has been chosen as room names as possible," Mr Green said.

The Countryside Service have been encouraging the planting of these traditional varieties over several years and runs a scheme through which people can buy such trees to grow at home.

Countryside officer Wade Muggleton added: "We were delighted when the Elms approached us for advice. It is great to work with the private sector in this way. "We hope the orchard will be a great success and raise awareness of the area's rich orchard heritage."