THE campaign to erect a statue of famed fossil hunter Mary Anning has reached a landmark in its fundraising efforts.

The group behind the Lyme Regis statue campaign can commission an artist to create the sculpture - and they want to include the community in their plans moving forward.

The campaign was started by local schoolgirl, Evie Swire, when she was just 11-years-old, because she couldn't understand why the renowned paleontologist had not already been immortalised in this way.

The amount raised has shot up by more than £20,000 over the past month. The current amount raised for the project is currently more than £82,000.

Having reached this amount, the group has now been able to commission sculptor, Denise Dutton, to create the statue. The group has pencilled in 21 May 2022, which would be Annings' 223rd birthday, as a potential unveiling date.

Anya Pearson, Evie's mother and a trustee of the campaign, said: "It’s fantastic that we’ve been able to reach this milestone.

"Mary Anning has such a large fanbase that the funding was always going to be achievable, we just needed to get the right publicity at the right time so that the campaign was able to reach the right people.

"Both Evie and myself are so thrilled – she’s just a schoolgirl and I’m just a mum, we’re far from professionals."

She added: "I'm a feminist and want my daughter to grow up with the same values and the fact that this woman has not had the recognition she deserves is wrong."

The next step will be to produce a maquette, a 12 to 13 inch 3D rendering of what the finished sculpture would look like. Once the model has been produced - this is expected to take around two to three months - the group hope they will be able to put together a socially-distanced event to invite the community to give their feedback.

Ms Pearson said: "We feel it’s incredibly important to engage with the community as the sculpture is going to be placed in their back garden.

"We want to be able to present something physical to the town in some way – in an ideal world we would have an event where people can come and have a coffee and chat to us.

"The hope is that by the time the maquette is ready, restrictions will be relaxed enough that we can have a bit of a socially-distanced celebration and invite the town to come and see the model."

The group now needs to continue to raise to fund the additional costs of the project, such as legal costs, planning permission and the transporting of materials.

Visit www.crowdfunder.co.uk/maryanningrocks/