A wallpaper firm is so proud of its roots that its adverts across the globe include the town where it all started alongside some of the world's most influential cities.

Graham and Brown, based in Blackburn's Furthergate Business Park and Shuttleworth Mead business park, Padiham, list Blackburn alongside Amsterdam, Lille, Moscow, New Jersey, Toronto and Warsaw on its advertising posters as bosses are so proud of the company's heritage.

The firm celebrates its 60th anniversary this year with a number of events, including a party for every member of staff and a new range of wallpaper.

The company is already world famous for working on lines with such interior design legends as Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen and Blackburn designer Wayne Hemingway.

And now the firm, which employs about 500 across the world including about 300 in East Lancashire, is drawing up plans to expand even further across the world.

Graham and Brown was started by two friends after the Second World War, and now has offices in countries including America, Canada, France, Holland, Poland, China and Russia.

Chief executive Andrew Graham said wallpaper will always will be made in Blackburn, and that the company would always remember how it was started in 1946.

He said "We are very proud of Blackburn because that is where the company was founded. It's a very personal story of Graham and Brown because it was started by two friends.

"I cannot imagine how difficult it was to start a business in post-war Britain.

"It must have been incredibly hard. These two guys decided they have wanted to create a business called Graham and Brown.

"When you think about the challenge when they started out it's incredible, and the fact that the business has lasted 60 years is incredible.

"This generation is borrowing the company. We are humble enough to understand where we came from.

"Those two guys had to be very creative. That creativity has actually stayed with the business and it's one of our core values.

"We are an extended family and have a very strong set of company values."

The firm claims to be the market leader in wallpaper, and supplies household names like B&Q, but is hoping to expand into other markets through a new company called Graham and Brown Home.

Through the new firm it will sell products including murals, prints and pieces of glass artwork to be hung on walls.

Mr Graham said: "In six years we have gone from being the fifth largest in the UK to be the market leader and we have done it by being different.

"But we cannot stop there. The UK business is very healthy but we have to grow our business internationally.

"Our retailers work internationally and our next challenge is that we have to become a global business.

"On the basis of very strong roots in Blackburn we are trying to become a global business that can compete with the best companies in the world."