Real stories · The cross in the hallway

I wanted one quiet corner of the house to feel steady — this cross made it the hallway

One quiet, steady thing to pass on the way out of the door — that's what I wanted for this house, and it's what this cross has become. I'm 67, and the winters have a way of filling up with worries: the news, the bills, the phone calls you brace for. Faith helps me carry that — it always has — but the house itself didn't show it anywhere. The cross I grew up with stayed at my mother's, and after she died it went to my sister. Fair enough. Still felt like a gap.

I'd looked before, but most of what I found was either flimsy or fussy.

Then I found the Christelle from a British label called York Boutique — a beautifully worked wall cross with the figure rendered in real detail, in a warm, aged finish that looks like it's been in the family far longer than it has. It hangs flat against the wall, needs one nail, and comes in three sizes — mine is the middle one, and it sits above the sideboard as if the wall had been waiting.

The detail is what makes it feel right. This isn't a flat cut-out shape — the folds, the thorns, the face are all properly modelled — which is why it reads as something made with reverence rather than printed by the thousand. You notice it the way you notice a photograph of someone you love: briefly, often, and always a little steadied.

Properly modelled, warmly finished, one nail in the hallway — which is why every trip out of the door now starts a little steadier than it used to.

Mine was £24.95 in the sale — all three sizes are half price, starting at £19.95 — and I did check I could send it back if it looked wrong in the hall: a fortnight, free delivery. It didn't look wrong. It looked like it had always been there.

When Margaret saw it she stopped in the hallway with her coat half on. 'Where did you get that? That's like my gran's.' That's rather the point, I said. She wrote the name down for her sister — the one who starts treatment in November — and I've since heard it's up, by the kitchen door, where she'll pass it every morning.

If there's a wall in your house — or in someone else's — that could use a quiet, steady corner, do have a look. The Christelle is rated 4.7 out of 5 by more than 210 customers, it comes in three sizes from 30cm to 50cm — and with the gift season coming, the middle size goes first.