THE CITY centre will be filled with stalls showcasing some of the best local businesses that Cumbria has to offer today as the Christmas market returns -with a twist.

Carlisle Christmas Market will be in Carlisle City Centre today with a huge selection of businesses for you to get your Christmas presents from.

The event will be Covid secure and organisers have set-up with the latest Government guidelines in mind.

Emma Heseltine-Armstrong, organiser of Carlisle Farmers' Market, said: "Since we have re-opened in July, we have done all our risk assessments and worked out how best to operate.

"We have hand sanitiser stations for people to use, we encourage pre-orders so you can contact all of the traders beforehand if you want o pre-order, and we have marked out space for people to make sure we just have one family or one customer at each stall at a time."

It won't be the typical "massive extravaganza" that people are used to but there will be plenty available.

There will be gin, candles, meat, concreatures, floral arrangements, photography, honey, and more.

This year has a twist as they have teamed up with the businesses from Etsy Made In Cumbria.

"We're doing a team-up with Etsy Made In Cumbria," said Emma.

"We've got 12 Etsy people coming, so that's a lot of lovely local crafters who have obviously had a horrible year not being able to go to their craft fairs."

The fair will be open today from 9.30am until 4pm.