HELEN Holdsworth has given new meaning to the expression 'a royal flush' with her project to celebrate the Queen's golden jubilee.

Helen has decorated her downstairs toilet at home in Netton Street, Bishopstone, to look like an imperial throne room.

"We live in an old cottage but it has a horrible modern extension with a loo that's just an overgrown cupboard," explained Helen, who used to work in interior design and now runs language clubs.

"The children had been putting pressure on me to do something wild, so, as it's the jubilee, I thought, 'Why not turn the loo into an imperial throne room?'.

"I painted the walls with Sanderson's imperial purple paint and then painted a throne behind the loo in red and gold.

"The loo is gold and silver and the vinyl floor is, too."

Finishing touches come in the shape of a gold-framed mirror decorated with plastic jewels and a teddy dressed in red and gold.

The children Amy (nine) and seven-year-old Oliver "absolutely love it", she said,.

She added: "Oliver and his classmates have made a picture to go on the door that says 'The Imperial Throne Room'.

"And Amy, who raises money for Sargent Cancer Care for Children, wants us to have an open loo day like an open garden day and charge people 50 pence to have a look.

"It will be a bit of fun, won't it?" she said.