AN antiques centre in Halstead has provided the setting for a BBC antiques show.

Halstead Antiques Centre welcomed crews from Antiques Road Trip on Tuesday morning as experts bagged themselves some goodies to auction on the show.

The popular show sees antiques experts searching for treasures, competing to make the most money at auction.

This is around the fifth time the show have visited the centre which attracts around 40,000 customers a year, making it a treasure trove for top quality antiques in the country.

Television personality and antique expert James Braxton visited the centre at Townsford Mill with new expert Izzie Balmer.

Between them they bought about five items, which will be featured when the show airs in the autumn.

Co-owner of the antiques centre Susan Killbery, 61, said it was a pleasure to have James, Izzie and the crew visiting.

They were also visited by the new series producer, who had travelled all the way from Glasgow to Halstead.

Susan said: “It is always great fun and they all seemed to like the centre.

“They’re all nice people to have around.”

She said being part of the show is a great way to get more people interested in antiques and the centre in Halstead.

“Doing the show always brings new people in who have seen us on the TV and visit because they haven’t been before.”

In previous visits other experts and celebrities had picked up goodies from the centre, including old indenture documents and beer tankards.

John Redshaw, series producer at STV Productions, said: “Halstead is a beautiful town and it always looks great on camera.

“The staff at Halstead Antiques Centre are friendly and knowledgeable, and the dealers have a great mix of collectables and curios.

“Our experts James Braxton and Izzie Balmer - who joins the show for the first time - were made very welcome there and bought a watercolour painting, a needlework sampler, some jewellery and an old hand tool, which they will attempt to sell at auction in Tring at the end of their trip.”

Townsford Mill dates back to 1740 and was one of the first Courtauld mills in the area.

It was converted to an antiques centre in the 1980s and is a popular local attraction, with some 80 dealers trading there.

The mill featured in series four of popular BBC TV hit antiques sleuth show Lovejoy in the Eighties.

Other Lovejoy film locations in the area included the Half Moon pub in Belchamp St Paul, the Fox Inn, at Finchingfield, Hedingham Castle, Coggesshall and Belchamp Walter’s St Mary’s Church.