Participants: Rob Wood, Paul Shanley, Victoria Evans, Kim Davies, Phil Caton, Emma Beales & Iain Barton.

What began with the idea of getting reactions from the public to the sight of three women dressed in iconic outfits walking through town, turned into something completely different? We were sat in the refectory at Pittville Campus on Wednesday March 17th 1999, discussing Kim, Vicki and Emma's idea of walking through town in a wedding dress, whore outfit and power dress. I volunteered to film peoples reactions and it went from there. "Perhaps we should emulate an entire wedding?" We quickly came up with a plan to walk through the centre of town with a small congregation celebrating the wedding of Vicki. It was always going to coincide with the races and so we decided to take our congregation up to the racecourse, perhaps try to get in. And so it developed, our lies getting thicker until the happy couple were accosted by the press and local radio, who were waiting for the arrival of the Queen Mother outside Pittville School. No attempt was made to conceal our performance art studentship and the press lapped up the story.

This year we considered replicating the process exactly with Phil and Vicki but we decided on a fresh couple to tempt the press. Following the same script we walked through town got ourselves a few drinks in and walked up Albert Road, stopping off at the S.U. bar. Unbelievably, even the students in the bar fell for our blatant lies. The difference this year was our entry into the race meet, via some trickery ticket tout manipulation by Phil. Five tickets for fifty knicker aint bad. Thanks go to the gentleman who gave us a tenner for a round of drinks and also Channel 4 for broadcasting us live into the homes of some of our surprised friends. What amazes me is not the ease of our own manipulation of the press but the way in which they manipulate the simplest of stories to their own benefit. We see this with the Echo stating that we 'abandoned the guests at their wedding reception and went to the Cheltenham Festival instead' and also the Sun reporting the following:

Losers in Love - Newly-weds Iain and Kim Barton, both 22, missed their own reception to have a flutter at the Cheltenham Festival, Gloucs - and lost £30

At no point did any of us report to anyone that we had lost £30 or any amount on the races.

Thanks go to Sue Ryder for the kind loan of wedding dress and matching footwear for Kim. Also Steve the Ticket Broker (0973 115013) and of course The Gloucestershire Echo, Western Daily Press, The Sun, Channel 4 racing & BBC Gloucestershire.

I. Barton (March 2000)