A budding web-wizard from Stroud College has won praise after playing a key role in developing closer links between England and France.

Matthew Turner was studying I.T. at the college, when he answered a call from Stroud’s growing twinning association for help in creating a website to promote its new link with the picturesque town of St Ismier in the French Alps.

The 18-year-old student had never built a website for anyone else before and has never even been to France. But members of the association, called Stroud French Connections, were so impressed with his efforts that they invited him to their annual fundraising dinner to say a big thank you.

‘Theirs was the first site I ever designed for someone else,’ he said.’ The association just gave me a rough idea of what they wanted and I put it all together. It was a really good experience.’

Matthew, from Wotton-under-Edge, has now landed a place on an I.T. degree course Cheltenham and has gone on to design other websites, including one for the Save Concorde Campaign and buswatch.net, a site for local bus fanatics.

He was presented with iTunes vouchers, when more than 30 members of French Connections gathered for a social get-to-gether at the Star Anise restaurant in Stroud.

‘It was wonderful that Matthew was able to help us to promote our new twinning initiative,’ said Secretary Pat Olsen. ‘Our website is one of the reasons why there is a growing interest in what we are doing. We are due to make our second visit to St Ismier in May, we have more than 50 members, and we are putting together a programme of events for the coming year

Andy Read writes:
It may have taken 700 years to get around to it, but everyone who returned from the first ever visit to Stroud’s new twin town, agreed it was well worth the wait.

Andy Read spent a weekend with families in the Alpine town of Saint Ismier and discovered a place that has a little bit of something for everyone.

In Stroud’s new twin town, one thought strikes you at every turn. Stop anywhere. Look in any direction. I guarantee that you will be constantly in awe of its amazing setting.

Located just eight miles from the Olympic city of Grenoble, the town is surrounded on all sides by the mountains, famous worldwide for their skiing and walking.

Behind you, bright green woods lead up to sheer, grey cliffs. If you turn around and gaze across the valley, your eyes follow endless rolling pastures and hills with cream-coloured villages nestled in odd nooks and crannies. And behind them, tower the peaks of The Alps – even in mid-summer they glisten and gleam with snow and glaciers. Welcome to Saint Ismier.

Due to the ease of a quick hop across the Channel, many English towns select places in Brittany or Normandy if they’re looking for a French twin. But Stroud is known for rarely taking the conventional route. So it’ll come as little surprise to see that Saint Ismier is actually located 750 miles away - almost as far east as you can go, yet still remain in France.

The roots of the new liaison were actually set 18 years ago when Saint Ismier councillor Christiane Milesi spent a week with her family in a holiday cottage in the village of Box, near Minchinhampton.

‘I always remembered it as such a beautiful part of the world,’ she recalls. Her council had been seeking a twin through numerous official routes for over two years. Frustrated at the delays, Christiane decided to use her local knowledge and with the help of a map and the internet, she wrote directly to every council in south Gloucestershire asking if they’d be interested in joining forces.

There was strong interest from Fairford, Dursley and a couple of other places, but Christiane was most tempted by the interest shown from Stroud. ‘We wanted a town that was different to us, so that it would provide plenty of options for people to develop interesting links. I knew Stroud from my visit 18 years ago and knew it would be a perfect place.’

Stroud too was not merely looking for a carbon copy of itself in another country. ‘We don’t want this to be an annual jolly for councillors,’ said Stroud’s Mayor Kevin Cranston, ‘but something that is led by local people. Therefore it had to be a place that would capture people’s imaginations. From what we have seen on our first visit, it will certainly do that.’

The French decided to base the visit of their new twin around the town’s annual Fete de la Musique. Not dissimilar to Stroud’s own Fringe Festival, the emphasis is on local talent. There is a main stage in the town square, along with choral performances in the beautifully simplistic church plus a stage for young performers. Hundreds of local residents looked on from the café and BBQ as the two mayors completed the official signing of the twinning agreement.

Thanks to its beautiful location close to Grenoble, the St Ismier of today is a fast growing and seemingly affluent town. In 1968 it had just 1,754 inhabitants. Today the population stands at more than 6,000. With planning controls lying with the town council, residents can retain the leafy feel to the housing by insisting on a minimum plot size of 1,500 square metres – plenty of room for the swimming pool and veranda!

With three primary schools, a secondary school and a library, along with a picturesque church, large sports centre and two sets of tennis courts the town has an abundance of facilities that ensures a real community feel to the place. It has a market every Saturday in the historic town square plus an agricultural college and numerous shops and restaurants. The 300-seater modern arts centre would be the envy of many English cities, let alone a small country town.

A walk around the fringes of St Ismier however, reveals its original purpose. ‘Originally this was all farmland,’ explains a lively, elderly lady standing at the gate of what was once an isolated cottage. ‘This was the gardener’s home for the main farm at the other end of the village which was, in the early 1800s, given to one of Napoleon’s senior officers.’

Elsewhere, a crumbling chateau peeps its head above the woods that look down on the town. Residents did set up an association to try to restore it but it had been empty for too long and nature is slowly reclaiming the site.

As for the future, Steve Hill a musician and chairman of Stroud’s newly-formed twinning association French Connections, believes the possibilities for local groups to develop links in France are endless.

Already several Stroud schools are taking advantage and interest has been shown from sports teams and even local hang-gliders, keen to try out new challenges. Saint Ismier’s annual directly lists more than 40 associations in the town from choirs, the environment and karate, to walking, dancing and a wide range of sports. The idea of Stroud choirs and musicians performing alongside French musicians at the Fete de la Musique in future years is already being pursued.