Royal wedding recreated with scarecrows

Findlay Farmer with his scarecrow royal wedding scene in Abbotsley

A royal enthusiast has recreated the wedding between Prince William and Kate Middleton for a scarecrow festival in a Cambridgeshire village.

The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge have yet to visit the county, but the pair are appearing at the festival in Abbotsley, near St Neots.

Keen royal-watcher, Findlay Farmer, built the Buckingham Palace balcony on to the wall of a former pub.

He said: "It's slowing up the cars. It's like a traffic calming measure."

The scarecrow festival's theme is television programmes and Mr Farmer said: "The royal wedding is something I really enjoyed watching, so I thought it would be perfect."

He explained that his montage was modelled on a photograph of the balcony scene and was "accurate in every detail".

'Net curtains'

He took his own photograph of the front of Buckingham Palace and asked a local company to create a 5m x 8m (16ft x 26ft) banner for the front of the pub.

Another friend added the ornamentation to the front of the balcony area.

"Of course, Kate's dress had to be right so I went to a local furnishing shop and bought some lace net curtains for that," Mr Farmer said.

"But absolutely everyone from the Middletons - and of course Pippa Middleton - had to be there, plus Kate, William, the Queen and Prince Philip.

"The only thing I had to move were the page boys as they were taking up a bit too much room, so I moved them to the edge."