A FORMER village farm shop is now being used as a wedding hire business.

Dorset Council has agreed the change of use for the Stevens Farm shop at Martinstown – to a store for wedding props.

The operators, Winterborne Hire and Styling, have been using the 170 square metre former farm shop building since January. They claim that generates far less traffic than the farm shop did and have the support of the parish council.

In a planning application the operators say the business will only be open for a very limited number of appointments each week with clients spending around 30 minutes on average in the building being shown items in stock.

Appointments are made only through a website and the business is not open to unscheduled visits from the public.

Most of the visits are expected to be in the autumn and spring months as stock levels at the showroom are depleted during the summer months with items usually held in store in use.

The business say deliveries take place on Thursdays and Fridays with return slots on Sunday afternoon or Mondays.

“As a small business we have the capacity to service a maximum of three weddings per week. Of these only 50% on average throughout the year require any kind of appointment at the premises,” said the application.

Three residents raised concerns about what they feared would be extra traffic on the farm track from the village main road, but Dorset Council highways officers said they had no objection to the use with the planning case officer deciding the storage and distribution was a suitable use for a former agricultural building.

 The former Martinstown farm shop and Interior of the wedding business. Courtesy Symonds & Sampson