Princes of Gwynedd Website

The Princes of Gwynedd website was launched this month at Dinas Emrys, the legendary birthplace of the Welsh red dragon. inHeritage wrote the English text for the website, which involved visiting the sites and consulting with key archaeologists.

The website is path of the Cadw pan-Wales heritage interpretation project. The Princes of Gwynedd story strand was developed by a consortium led by Conwy County Borough Council in partnership with Gwynedd Council, Snowdonia National Park Authority and the National Trust. The website and 6 visitor hubs tell the unique story of the longest and most successful dynasty in medieval Wales - from the castles the princes built to the royal courts where they ruled - through thirty iconic sites linked to the princes.

You can visit the website at http://www.snowdoniaheritage.info/en/theme/29/princes-of-gwynedd

"The princes of Gwynedd traced their royal line back to ancient times and became the most powerful dynasty in medieval Wales. Their kingdom stretched from the fertile lands of Anglesey to the soaring peaks of Snowdonia and at one point expanded to cover much of Wales.

For more than 800 years, the princes fought with one another and the English crown to secure their positions of power. But this was not just a time of war and turmoil. The princes forged strong cultural and religious links with continental Europe and were patrons of beautiful architecture, music and poetry.

Their legacy can be found today throughout North West Wales. Why not follow in the footsteps of the princes, and discover hidden castles, royal residences and tranquil churches set in breathtaking landscapes?

Monsal Trail Walk

The Walks Around Britain video features the Peak District's Monsal Trail and the inHeritage audio player of railway memories.

Sounding Out Interpretation

Inside the Circle of Fire is a new exhibition at Sheffield's Millennium Galleries by Cabaret Voltaire co-founder Chris Watson. Chris spent 18 months recording the sounds of Sheffield to create this immersive sound map of the city's heart beat, from bird song in Ecclesall Woods or on the city's Peak District fringe to Forgemaster's blast furnaces, football crowds and Fargate on a Friday night. He deliberately calls the exhibition a site-specific sound map which recreates the sounds of 21st Century Sheffield. He hopes audiences have a creative relationship with the exhibition, there imaginations stimulated by recognisable and personal sounds.

Sound from Inside the Circle of Fire.

I visited the exhibition today and was struck by the emotional and powerful potential of using artistically-conceived sound as interpretation in a gallery environment.

Reclining on a cushion, I was transported directly and vividly to places I associated with the sounds. Strong, personal connections though none of the sounds were otherwise signposted or captioned. You, as listener had to actively work to make those connections, to interpret the places in Sheffield evoked in the songs of birds and chants of football crowds, in the roar of furnaces and churn of rivers. Each new sound brought a place, sometimes more than one, to mind and raised a range of emotions, all of which originated from my own experiences of those 'imagined' places. I assume that sometimes the places I associated with the sounds are the same locations Chris recorded and sometimes they are different. I will have no way of knowing beyond the small number of places mentioned in the exhibition's publicity. Perhaps I transmuted the sound of the crowd at Bramall Lane into my real-life experience of matches at Hillsborough - or vice versa. It really doesn't matter, what is important is that I re-envisaged a moment in my life in Sheffield through the power of sound. Projected photographs do aid place recognition, but are never displayed to match the sounds. The exhibition probably does require you to have life experiences of Sheffield to create strong, emotional remembrances and mental geo-transportations.

Sound from Inside the Circle of Fire. With added surreal dimension from a four-year old's voiceover on behalf of a soap.

This is aural art as part-celebration, part-interpretation of a contemporary landscape and biographically timelined relationships with it. Sound enables emotional triggers which (re)create moments in time and space so that exhibition audiences dynamically reveal and tell their own stories of places in reaction to those sounds. Multiple personal conversations are provoked between spatial structure and the individual in a way that didactic interpretation can not manage. Inside the Circle of Fire is a good example of how successfully and powerfully we can interpret places by providing space for the audiences to do some of the work themselves.

Chris Watson talks about Inside the Ring of Fire

http://youtu.be/h1x_wvFmqi8

Hands on History Barnsley - Test Pits Day 1 - the video

Hands On History Barnsley: First test pits

Hands On History Barnsley: First test pits: Day one of the 2013 season of test pits - New Lodge Crescent, with a visit from Barnsley Central MP and Shadow Minister for Culture and Her...

Calver Weir Finale

Calver Weir Exhibition

The Calver Weir oral history project came to a glorious end this weekend with an exhibition in Calver Village Hall.

Over 200 people visited the exhibition over the weekend. The launch was attended by 10 interviewees, 2 Heritage Lottery Fund officers, all of the oral history team and about another 15 residents and visitors.

Interviewees watch the movie

The event was the culmination to 18 months hard work by the team, who had recorded 22 interviews and searched Derbyshire Record Office's collection of Calver Mill documents. Highlights include finding the sources of the 19th century mill's cotton and the range of tools required each year to keep it operating, childhood memories of playing on the weir and river, working life at Sissons stainless steel factory and the filming of Colditz by the BBC. The main success was seeing a group of people come together, learn historical skills and work as a team.

The oral history team

inHeritage has been involved with the project throughout, mentoring and guiding the volunteers and producing a travelling exhibition, booklet, movie, comic and podcasts. We have also created an archive which is deposited in Calver, Derbyshire Record Office, the Peak District National Park Authority and the East Midlands Oral History Archive.

Booklet, comic and celebratory ale 

The Movie

The exhibition

The comic

The food

Hands on History Barnsley

We are just starting a new three-year archaeology project north of Barnsley, in Athersley, New Lodge and Smithies. Bill is project managing for the Romero Communities as well as providing interpretation services and archaeological advice. We are also contributing some educational activities. We are working with local archaeological contractors who will supervise and train volunteers in test pit excavation, finds processing, geophysics and fieldwalking.

The first season of garden and school playing-field test pits begins on Monday 2nd September.

You can find out more at http://handsonhistorybarnsley.blogspot.co.uk

Here is the press release:

The Romero Communities have received £79,800 from the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) for an exciting project, Hands on History, in Athersley and New Lodge. Led by volunteers from the local community, the project aims to help local residents discover the archaeological past beneath our feet and lead courses in archaeology and local history. The project begins in September and runs until May 2016.

Explaining the importance of the HLF award, Fiona Spiers, Head of the Heritage Lottery Fund -Yorkshire and the Humber said “This exciting project will enable people to actively learn about the history of their local area and gain skills in archaeological investigation.  This project really will uncover the hidden heritage of Athersley and New Lodge, letting everyone get involved and learn about their community’s past!”

Carol Clair of Romero Communities says “We are grateful to the Heritage Lottery Fund who have awarded the grant to look into the archaeological history of Athersley and New Lodge. This means we can dig archaeological test pits, do geophysical surveys and run courses in archaeology and local history. Anyone who would like to have a go at archaeology is welcome. You don’t need to know how to dig or do geophys as archaeologists will train and supervise you. We will also provide all equipment.”

The test pits will be dug in people’s gardens during September for the next three years. We are looking for finds such as old pots and clay tobacco pipes that can show how the area was used before the estates were built. In October, we also hope to do geophysical surveys of the area to the north to see what ancient features are buried beneath the soil. Pupils from all three local primary schools will also get the chance to join in. They will dig test pits in their school grounds and have lessons about archaeology.

Finds from the test pits will be shown at a Finds Road show in November.

Turner Trails in Boroughbridge

Just come across one of our 2011 Turner Trails panels at Boroughbridge information centre.

Bedford River Valley Park

Bedford Borough Council secures Heritage Lottery Fund investment for heritage interpretation at Bedford River Valley Park

A major project to improve the Bedford River Valley Park has been awarded a grant of £78,900 by the Heritage Lottery Fund. Bedford Borough Council, working in partnership with the Marston Vale Trust has secured the grant to bring the park’s historic landscapes and archaeological remains to life through heritage interpretation.

The Bedford River Valley Park Heritage Interpretation Project uses interactive and unique tools such as interpretation panels, listening posts, a geocache trail, leaflets and guided walks to bring the history of the park to life and help visitors to appreciate the rich heritage of the park and how human activity has helped to shape the landscape.  Heritage interpretation specialists inHeritage will work with the partnership and local volunteer groups to deliver the project.

Robyn Llewellyn, Head of Heritage Lottery Fund East of England, said: “This is going to be such a fun and interesting project, getting people involved in history, archaeology and their natural surroundings.  It’s great that local volunteers are very much part of the project and there will be opportunities for people to do research, guide walks and much more to enhance this fascinating area.”

Mayor of Bedford Borough, Dave Hodgson, said: “Bedford River Valley Park is an incredibly exciting project which will create the largest area of publicly accessible green space in Bedfordshire and link the heart of the town with the wider countryside. “The grant from Heritage Lottery Fund will help improve the park even more by bringing the park’s many historic and archaeological features to life in a fun, interactive and accessible way.”

Forest of Marston Vale Trust’s Chief Executive, Nick Webb, said: "The support of the Heritage Lottery Fund, in this partnership of the Marston Vale Trust with Bedford Borough Council, is crucial in bringing the fascinating history of the area to life. The rich history adds to the appeal and diversity within the Bedford River Valley Park and we look forward in working with Bedford Borough on this project."

Bedford River Valley Park has a fascinating archaeological and historical record, including many scheduled monuments and listed buildings, earthworks, cropmarks and the evidence from numerous archaeological investigations. The Great Ouse River Valley has been inhabited for millennia, as demonstrated by the survival of prehistoric landscape features across the park, including burial sites and mortuary enclosures for laying out the dead. These Neolithic and Bronze Age monuments were replaced during the Iron Age and Roman periods by agriculture and settlement including small farmsteads and a villa. In the medieval period, the landscape was dominated by castles and Newnham Priory, which gives Priory Country Park its name. Newnham Priory was founded in the 12^th century and demolished during the Reformation by Henry VIII. There are many listed buildings of post-medieval date in the area and recent history can be seen in the 17th century Great Ouse navigation and the track bed and bridges of the 19th century Bedford to Sandy railway.

What's the Point of Panels?

There is a lot of point, very much so, but you'll have to read to the end to find out how!

I am sad to say I have seen a lot of terrible interpretation panels recently. I don't mean panels that I have a few criticisms about here and there, picking out some phrasing, choice of an image or tweaking the layout for improvement. I refer to panels so bad I recoil in horror at the sight of them. The reaction is physical and emotional, much to the amusement of colleagues, friends and families I have been with at the time.

Friends wonder why I should have such a strong impulse to complain about them when, they argue, it's just a notice board, nothing important. That just throws the problem into starker relief. People who recall positively a newspaper headline or Facebook post, bringing them up in the time-honoured 'did you see?' type conversation, barely notice the 'notice boards' stuck resolutely and firmly into the ground a few feet away because the panels fade so effectively into the background. These panels, having had hundreds of pounds of public, Lottery or charity money thrown their way, are resolutely invisible despite their hardwood legs of elephantine girth and their invitation to discover wonders about the place we have spent time and effort to visit.

Why should so many panels fail so spectacularly? Could they be a redundant technology, a throw back to an analogue past of VHS videos, cassette tapes, milk bottles on the doorstep, child-delivered newspapers and paying a person to hand deliver your message in the form of a written letter? Would my friends be switched on more by the offer of an app to help them explore in the digital world the woodland/nature reserve/castle* we visit?

* delete as applicable.

I believe not, but the panels I've seen lately would suggest the bell is about to toll unless some basic principles are considered.

Why?

I have seen panels with shy, eight-or-more-word titles, hiding somewhere along the top, set in a point size and tone variation of the background colour which makes them only readable from close by. It's as if a timid thesaurus-devouring dormouse has been asked to suggest how he or she might like to describe what the panel is about, if they wouldn't mind. Then comes the essay, or abstract of an essay, on the subject arranged around a chicane of four to five moderately sized images parked randomly across the panel. None are given any prominence and sometimes an image is simply a poor reproduction of what is in plain sight in front of you. I've seen numerous panels tucked away from main visitor entry points and thoroughfares, as if they somehow might cause embarrassment if positioned too obviously to be read.

What this amounts to is a panel that does not achieve its first aim - to attract the visitor over to see it.

For panels to work they need to adhere to a few basic principles based on visitor behaviour.

They should be positioned and designed to reach out and grab the visitor's attention within the second, or less, that the visitor takes to pass by. Once they have captured the visitor, they need to offer a story which can be easily recognised and navigated through within the few seconds a visitor will spend assessing whether the panel offers anything of interest to compete with their other desires, or that of their dog, children, bladder, stomach, etc. Text should be short and evocative, based on the maxim that he more you write the less the visitor will read.

We can learn about good panel design by going to the newsagent or supermarket newspaper stand where we can see the art of the daily newspaper front page. Whether tabloid or broadsheet, each title throws its message at you in an alluring, large print headline and a single, captivating, large image. This art, or technique, is, of course, borne from the knowledge that each title jostles with the competition for attention. In the second or two you pass by on your way to buy your chocolate, drink, lottery ticket or milk, good design can tip the balance from indifference to impulse purchase.

We should be creating panels which do this too, panels which are so attractive they make visitors stop in their tracks and learn something new - on impulse. This doesn't mean they have to be garish, crass or appeal to a lowest common denominator. They shouldn't distract from the place they are set in but neither should they hide themselves away. Just that they borrow from the front page the craft of captivating communication through a short and easily visible title, a strong lead image and brief text broke into easily navigable paragraphs with a hook at the start and a written style enticing the visitor to read on. This will motivate the visitor to stop, to browse and to be drawn through the panel to construct meaning and discover what the panel aims to say. its a case of making sure the visitor can process the story quickly enough to want to stay longer and discover more.

The creation of panels which will be read is a creative and imaginative process. Each sentence, image and element of layout should be made to work hard to make the visitor's experience of panels engaging, rewarding and thought-changing.

Substitute dog walk for chocolate, habitats for political blunders, historical event for sporting contest, and you can take inspiration from the newspaper to create a series of front pages across a property without descending into the obvious or banal. That way the effort and resources spent on creating panels will be worthwhile because they will reach out, capture the visitor's attention and open their minds.

Interpreting our Outdoor Heritage

Bill has written an article for CJS Focus on behalf of the Association for Heritage Interpretation. Published today, it is an introduction to outdoor interpretation for countryside property managers.

Its currently online at http://www.countryside-jobs.com/Focus/Current.htm.

Grenoside Reading Room

The Grenoside Reading Room Trustees have installed a panel about the history of the reading room linked to local industrialists. inHeritage produced the panel, developing the concept, liaising with the local history group, writing the text, design and managing production.

The panel also signposts local industrial sites people can visit in and around Grenoside. The panel is on the exterior wall of the newly refurbished reading room. A QR code links to the reading room website where you can find out more about the building and its history.

The panel has been funded by the East Peak Innovation Partnership Industrial Heritage Support Programme.

World Heritage Cities for the Future

Opening session in Lyon's Hotel de Ville

Bill attended the Cities and Heritage Meeting held in Lyon on the 22nd - 24th May. The meeting was organised by the Lyon municipality, in partnership with the Organisation of World Heritage Cities, to celebrate the 15th anniversary of the designation of Lyon as a world heritage site by UNESCO. The meeting's theme was a sustainable future for world heritage cities.

Lyon's historic St Jean quarter with Fourvière Basilica and
the Tour métallique above

Lyon is a wonderful historic city which developed at the confluence of the Rhône and Saône rivers, first as the Roman capital of Gaul then in Renaissance and later guises. During the 16th century it was the home of the French court while they wade wars in Italy. A major silk-making industry developed at the north of the peninsula between the two rivers. Despite being the fourth largest city in France, the well-preserved historic quarter has an intimate atmosphere that belies the sheer size of Lyon and deserves to be better known as a heritage tourist destination in the UK. Here are covered alleyways which connect one street to another by way of hidden Renaissance courtyards, graceful grids of 18h century buildings, a grandiose Neoclassical Palace of Justice and an imposing riverside hospital which would not disappoint any capital city as a country's parliament building. Graceful bridges span the two rivers, while river bank esplanades open up vistas to appreciate the richness of the city's architecture. Above all of these stand the ornate edifice of the Fourvière Basilica and the Tour métallique.

The meeting was part-workshop, part-celebration of world heritage cities and the work municipal officers and politicians are putting in to grapple with heritage preservation and economic development. Can both be mutually compatible, where heritage opens up opportunities for financial improvement, or are they in such conflict that heritage is an obstacle that urban planners need to overcome to ensure the economic well-being of the city? The meeting met this question head on through case studies followed by sessions about sustainable development, citizen participation and adaptive reuse. The audience was a mixture of municipal officers and elected politicians.

Towards the end of the meeting a representative from Mali spoke about recent damage to Timbuktu and the work to restore structures and salvage burnt documents. The presentation put much into perspective regarding managing world heritage cities against risk.

City politicians and officers discuss heritage and development

Sustainable Development

In many cities developers, planners and politicians view heritage as a brake on economic growth. Historic buildings are often viewed as an impediment to successful development and, at worse, torn down to make way for construction to ensure the city's economy can continue to prosper.

The meeting presented examples where making the most of heritage and improving the historic environment can be drivers for development. All successfully put heritage at the heart of redevelopment, using heritage as an economic stimulant in very different ways. They brought to mind recent successes and failures in my own city of Sheffield where 19th century educational buildings central to the origins of the University have become a hotel and bars, and where new open spaces blend traditional city materials with modern designs, but also where the University has dropped a plan to convert part of the listed Jessops Hospital in preference for demolition to increase the size while reducing the cost of the new Faculty of Engineering, an inappropriate modern intervention into a square surrounded by listed buildings.

Lyon is creating a new riverside esplanade along the Saone which will build on the economic success world heritage designation has brought to the city through increased tourism.  

Porto is regenerating the Morro da Sé district as a mixed-use, inter-generational area where new residents and tourists will both contribute to the city's economy. Ruined buildings will be brought back into use with modern materials that echo the historic fabric.

Beemster, Netherlands, has a quality team who advise on new planning applications through identifying whether they contribute to what it is to be 'Beemster like'. The team have worked with a cheese company to build a nee factory which is the largest structure in the world heritage area but relates to the divine proportion of Fibonacci's Sequence of 1.618 that the Beemster landscape was originally laid out along. 

Strasbourg has a green transport infrastructure policy which encourages greater spend in its city centre by ensure that lower numbers of cars make it a much more pleasant place to visit, shop, eat and drink. 

Hôtel-Dieu

Adaptive Reuse

The two key examples here were from Lyon and La Chaux-de-Fonds, Switzerland. The former's Hôtel-Dieu has been a hospital since the medieval period, its grand 18^th century facade and cupola dominating the west bank of the Rhone. It was enlarged up to the 20th century but became unsuitable for modern hospital health care. The scale of the building is staggering, perhaps best illustrated by two statistics - it has 2,000 rooms and 2 hectares of roofs. The city is now grappling with the challenge of revitalising the building for modern use while incorporating the different phases of construction. The plan is for a mixed use development including a hotel, convention centre, museum, apartments, offices and shops, while creating public access by opening inner courtyards and making thoroughfares.

In La Chaux-de-Fonds, which originated ss a 19th century watchmaking town, a strip of industrial wasteland alongside railway tracks at the bottom of the slope of watchmaking buildings will be redeveloped. New buildings will follow the same dimensions and axis of earlier buildings to fit with the 19th century urban rationale. 

Hôtel-Dieu offers an exciting opportunity to reuse an historic building which is also a major city landmark. It is not without its controversy, as one Lyon resident told me many residents do not like a public building supported with public funds going into private for-profit use. The amount of public access being created does appear to counter this and I wonder how much these plans have been communicated to the wider city population.

Historic and modern together

Both plans involve new buildings and the architect's drawings show very generic modern steel and grass structures which have been constructed in many European cities over the last 15 years. While the scale and form may relate to the historic architecture, the materials suggest 'everytown' buildings that do not relate to the older structures. If these designs on paper make it to concrete and steel they will be a lost opportunity by the architects to creatively and deeply engage with the original buildings in creating dynamic, modern and harmonious new structures.

Citizen Participation

This session highlighted the involvement of Lyon in the Heritage Open Days and in the guidance of managing the Albi world heritage designation. In Regensburg, Germany, came an excellent presentation on concrete methods to develop ground-up participation based on the understanding that cities are created from the continuous interaction between inhabitants and places. Municipalities need to mobilise their citizens, find ways to open up two-way communication between the people leading projects and residents. The question was posed - are citizens really at the core of public action and governance? The answers lie in designing urban objects to meet local realities, respecting citizens' traditions and skills, and integrating citizens participation into planning and development. This is necessary to encourage representative democracy. It improves quality of life and strengthens social cohesion within community. But, to do so requires a new urban mind set – that heritage is not an obstacle but the resource for the whole community – and so change perceptions so that conservationists and developers are not on opposite sides.

This was one of the most inspiring presentations of the conference. It requires a different way of thinking from politicians and municipal officers, a letting go of control so that the municipality works more for sand with its residents rather than doing things to them. It should work well on the neighbourhood scale. In Sheffield the community assemblies went part-way to doing this, before being scaled back, and now it is left once again to the motivated individuals of residents’ associations and local forums to  take this form of participation to the council – on the outside calling in.

Summary

I left the conference inspired by what many cities are striving for in their desire to not just balance heritage and development, but in trying to use heritage as a positive driver of development which is brings out local distinctiveness as a force for economic growth rather than reducing city after city to a generic look-a-like. While world heritage designation is the motivation for the politicians and officers gathered here, the ideas and lessons can be applied to any town or city – but it does require a change of mind set and a broader, longer vision amongst the elected and the appointed than perhaps many urban areas are perhaps currently blessed with. At least for now. Some examples for this meeting can show some of the ways forward.

  

Castleton - Hope Exhibition Launches

Project steering group - Alan, Angela, Di, Bill, Kay and Ann
after installing the exhibition

Yesterday Hope and Castleton Historical Societies launched the Lives of the Common People exhibition at Castleton Visitor Centre.

inHeritage has worked with the societies to produce the exhibition as part of our involvement throughout the project. The exhibition is one result from over a year of work by 65 volunteers who have researched hundreds of documents, excavated 55 test pits and surveyed three old routeways as part of the Heritage Lottery Fund supported Lives of the Medieval Common People.

Visitors browse exhibition panels and pottery display

The societies developed the themes, in a session with the project steering group led by Bill at Castleton Visitor Centre in March. These are the search for the common people, farmers, lead miners, routes, churches, houses and everyday objects. Bill drafted nine panels of text based on this session, selected photographs taken by participants and directed society members to take photographs specially for the exhibition. Once the steering group were happy with the text and images, inHeritage offered 8 different design styles with varying types of layout and fonts to the group to choose. The final style was a combination of two of these sample layouts. We then managed production, choosing a drop-down banner style as the best solution to hang in the visitor centre and for later use by the societies.

Project participants Jill, Dave and Leah at the launch

The steering group also chose finds from the test pits to display in two exhibition cabinets. These include parts of a human skeleton, a cat skeleton, clay tobacco pipes, pottery and medieval window glass.

Ken Smith opens the exhibition

Forty people attended the launch of the exhibition yesterday, all of them either participating in project research or providing their gardens for test pits.  The exhibition was opened by Ken Smith, Cultural Heritage Team Manager for the Peak District National Park Authority, with Chris Pennell and Geoff Nickolds from the HLF's East Midlands committee also present.

HLF East Midlands Committee Chair Chris Pennell says a
few words

Di Curtis, project steering group member, thanks everyone
involved

The exhibition is open until Thursday 30th May. Entry is free during the visitor centre's opening times. You can find times and other centre details on the Authority's website.

The exhibition will then be displayed by Hope Historical Society at Hope Wakes Week between Saturday 22nd and Sunday 30th June.

The Societies are grateful to the Heritage Lottery Fund, the Peak District National Park Authority and the University of Sheffield for their support.

Walkley Memories Day

Thank you to everyone who came to and helped make the Walkley Memories Day such a resounding success on Friday afternoon.

Walkley Community Centre was abuzz with residents and ex-residents sharing their memories, photos and documents of Walkley's rich history. Ruskin Hall looked splendid with tables, each with plates of biscuits, scattered around the room.

Over 65 people came along between 2pm and 5pm, while 21 volunteers welcomed and talked to visitors, scanned photos and documents, and helped serve tea and coffee. There was also a slideshow of old images collected by the project so far and an exhibition. Some visitors went upstairs to look at the Reform Club World War 1 memorials in the snooker room.

We found out about all aspects of Walkley's history, from World War 1 to the 1970s, and saw an original letter written home from the First World War trenches by one brother to another.

Volunteers worked tirelessly to record recollections, with two people kept very busy on the photo scanner that luckily bounces. One lucky person now has the task of putting the names and details on a list so we can begin contacting those people who have asked to be recorded.

Calver Weir Oral History

The Calver Weir oral history project is coming towards the end of the interview phase this month. Volunteers have completed over 14 interviews. Five of these are now online, which cover the early history of the mill, Sissons and the restoration of the weir. Future podcasts will include the river and Colditz.

http://www.calverweir.org.uk/page1/page1.php

Tideswell Trail Re-used

The 2011 Tideswell Trails Hidden Histories self-guided leaflet used in Tideswell Church by local artist John Firth. He is using the map to locate his drawings of local places, asking people to guess the locations.

Hope - Castleton Finds Day

Today was another successful finds day for the Hope and Castleton Lives of the Medieval Common People project.

Ninety people came to see the finds from 50 test pits dug in the Derbyshire villages in 2012.

Cottingham Training

One Mark Kirby Scholar talks about Cottingham's past

Today we began work with Cottingham Parish Council on a series of workshops exploring the 18th Century history of the village, which lies on the outskirts of Hull. Over the next.three months we will deliver four workshtoops linking archival sources, archaeology and hands-on activities to discover childhood, costume, food and farming 300 years ago.

Today was about introducing the project to participants and training them in heritage interpretation and digital media. We have set up Wordpress, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube accounts for volunteers to record the workshops. They will also produce an exhibition for Cottingham Day in July.

Follow their progress at cottinghamstory.wordpress.com and on Twitter @CottinghamStory.

Walkley History update

Great night with the Walkley historians last night. Seventeen people gathered around tables in Walkley Community Centre with maps, documents and photos to decide who is going to research what from the lives of WW1 soldiers through the early years of Walkley Reform Club to post-war life, slum clearance and the Walkley Action Group campaign.

Then, we followed the historian session with the second of two oral history training workshops at the Centre. There are now 21 trained oral historians ready to hit the streets of Walkley to discover its remembered past! Some will begin recording family, friends and neghbours. We also have about 30 people who have been in touch asking to be recorded.

Today, we spent an hour with Veronica Hardstaff in Ruskin Park, identifying which demolished streets local school children will mark out across the park for the Walkley Festival’s Ruskin Park Fun Day on the 6th July. The even numbers of Harworth Steet are definitely on to do, including the club at the corner with Daniel Hill St.

Some of the stalls will be in people’s houses, hopefully the beer tent in a back garden and the stage in the club.

We will write potted biographies of families from as many demolished homes as we can, with names and occupations, display photos and produce a discovery trail for families.

Princes of Gwynedd

We are happy to announce inHeritage are working on the Princes of Gwynedd project.

We are writing website text for 30 sites in north Wales as well as pages on ten key figures in the history of the region during the Medieval period.

The aim is to encourage visitors to explore the sites, discover key features and connect different places to make itineraries.

We will be visiting as many of the sites as possible in late February before drafting texts during early March.