MAIDSTONE'S new Rose Garden will be officially opened on Saturday, December 15. The Mayor of Maidstone, Cllr Paulina Stockell, will perform the opening ceremony at the garden near the Hermitage Millennium Amphitheatre and Lockmeadow Millennium Bridge.

The garden has 600 roses - just some of the many needed for the county town to boast a national rose collection. To achieve the status, the town needs a minimum of 80 species of rose. The roses are being planted in flowerbeds all around the Archbishop's Palace.

Attending the opening ceremony will be hundreds of people who sponsored the garden which forms part of the Maidstone Millennium River Park, a scheme enhancing the banks of the River Medway between Teston and Allington.

After the celebrations, Cllr Stockell will lead a lantern procession across the Lockmeadow bridge to the amphitheatre for a candlelit Christmas carol concert. People are invited to pay £10 to dedicate a rose to a loved one. For information, contact Dorothy Phillips on 01622 602718.

Mrs Phillips invited people to sponsor other River Park projects. For £25 they can sponsor a brick forming part of a path in Whatman Park. The name of a loved one can be engraved on the brick.