A DERELICT railway station which used to welcome royalty and has now been turned into a visitor centre was brought back to life this weekend.

A working model of Thorpe Thewles station was set up in the village hall, complete with the different types of locomotives that would have steamed through it.

The re-creation, by Dave Thurlwell, from Gilesgate Moor, Durham City, was filmed for posterity as part of a £10,000 grant from Awards for All given to the Thorpe Thewles History Group.

It used the grant to buy laptops and filming equipment to produce a DVD-based audio-visual account of life during the past 100 years.

Royalty visiting Wynyard Hall, now owned by former Newcastle United chairman Sir John Hall, would alight at Thorpe Thewles station on to a red carpet before being whisked away by coach.

In 1894, permission was given to Lord Londonderry to stop trains, in particular the 7.50am from Newcastle and the 6.30am from York.

The station became a visitor centre in 1983 for 400 acres of parkland, which was renamed Wynyard Woodland Park in 2004.