FROM the set of horror movie Sleepy Hollow to a Japanese water garden or an Oxfordshire shopping centre - the handiwork of manufacturing company Desney Products, of Banbury, can pop up just about anywhere.

Desney has carved itself a niche in a specialised market - making artificial trees and plants for shopping centres, stage and film sets.

Its trees have appeared in James Bond films and its foliage peeped out from the twisted tree where the headless horseman hides in Tim Burton's Sleepy Hollow.

So Desney was a natural choice when the Chisinau National Opera, from the former Soviet Union, wanted a Japanese water garden for its touring production of Madama Butterfly.

The garden - complete with real running water - has to be assembled on stage at 26 venues in six weeks - including the Apollo Theatre, Oxford, where it will appear on February 13.

Desney is supplying cherry trees, acers and foliage to bring the water garden to life.

Desney Products manager Steve Linford said: "This is an exciting project for us. This set is an accurate reproduction of a real Japanese water garden, the like of which is seldom seen live on stage."

Desney employs more than 30 people making plastic and polyester foliage and creating realistic trees, ferns, ivies and bonsai plants using real stems from local woodlands.

Its handiwork appears in the foyers of grand hotels, at shopping centres like the Westgate in Oxford and Templars Square in Cowley, as well as in Butlins' new indoor pavilions at Bognor, Minehead and Skegness.

Story date: Thursday 03 February

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.