The results of the CPRE Wiltshire Best Kept Village Competition have been announced.
Ashton Keynes, Upper and Lower Seagry and Hankerton came top in their respective size categories and are this year’s winners, with Ashton Keynes securing the Large Village accolade.
None have won at county level for at least 20 years, but all have been regular entrants during that time.
In all categories the spread of scores was very small, which the CPRE says demonstrates that the standard was very high in all villages.
CPRE Project Officer Mike Manson said: “It is important to point out that this competition could not take place without the very generous contributions of our sponsors, the support of Wiltshire Council, the large team of volunteer judges and of course the immense hard work put in by individual parish councils and villagers.
"It is a joint effort but one we feel benefits Wiltshire and in particular the participating villages.”
The first round of the competition saw the expert judging teams from the Wiltshire Branch of the Campaign to Protect Rural England and from Wiltshire Council putting each village under the microscope in May and June.
A total of 30 villages throughout the county were tested against the competition criteria which included tidiness, cleanliness, presentation, conservation and village community spirit.
The CPRE said that, as ever, the parish councils and their volunteers had clearly been hard at work, achieving encouragingly high standards and making the judges’ task that much more difficult.
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