By Pam McClounie City centre reporter

Last updated at 10:03, Saturday, 07 April 2012

American fashion designer Ben de Lisi has gifted a Carlisle bar one of his cushions after a similar one went missing.

A bulldog cushion like this was taken from the bar

Gill Ellis from The Lane bar on Long Lane wrote to Ben after the cushion, featuring his French bulldog Ella, was stolen last weekend.

Gill said: “We have got CCTV but unfortunately it didn’t manage to capture this particular theft.

“I trawled the internet on Sunday and Monday looking to replace the cushion but it was last season’s stock and I couldn’t find one.

“I put a message on Facebook asking whoever took it to bring it back – but to no avail.

“So I then went on Ben’s website and sent him a personal message telling him about how upset I was at losing the Ella cushion.”

Gill says she likes to have quirky decor and accessories in her bar on Long Lane to make it look nice.

The cushion was purple with a picture of the dog, wearing a red collar, on it.

She said: “In my email I said to him that he might think it strange of me to email him and I told him a bit about the bar and about losing the cushion.”

To Gill’s amazement she received a reply from Ben saying he would see what he could do.

“I really didn’t expect a reply so I was over the moon,” she said.

Ben, who is a designer for Debenhams, forwarded Gill’s email to one of his assistants, asking her to try and find a cushion.

Gill said: “I had a reply from her saying she had managed to find one in red, but not purple, and that it was going to be sent to me as a gift from Ben.

“I am so overwhelmed by his generosity.”

The cushion has not yet arrived, but Gill says they will be having some kind of ceremony when it does.

She said: “I think we will be keeping it under lock and key from now on.

“It just makes me sad that we try and make the bar look nice yet people think they can just take stuff.

“I didn’t report the theft to the police as we have no idea who took it.”

Ben won the coveted British Glamour Designer of the Year award twice in 1994 and 1995.

First published at 08:58, Saturday, 07 April 2012
Published by http://www.newsandstar.co.uk