#COP26 is behind us and more than ever we are aware of the huge work and efforts in front of us all. How can heritage interpretation contribute to raising awareness, making people more mindful about our actions and what is the reality out there? We would like to hear your thoughts.

Since its launch in 2019, IE has been a member of Climate Heritage Network, discussing the role of cultural heritage for tackling climate change and achieving the ambitions of the Paris Agreement. Also emphasising the role of cultural heritage. In the first part, IE’s Natural Heritage Coordinator Vida Ungar will talk about the network and IE’s involvement in it. She will also present cases that showcase how heritage interpretation can play a vital role in climate change and sustainability.

The second part will be over to you for lively discussion. We hope you can join us!

As  IE members you are welcome to join us on Zoom (registration needed), follow the livestream or watch recordings in the IE members group on Facebook.

For IE members only. To join & share click here.

This spring, IE’s Gastronomic Heritage Team hosted one of the online Thematic tables to help attendees think about their own experiences with food and explore methods of interpreting food.

Using all five senses (smell, taste, sight, sound and touch) as a means to focus our experiences, the attendees chose to join a small breakout group and discussed how they have seen the stories of food interpreted, or talked about their own personal experience. What did we discover?

Smell is a key sense when food is a focus. Research shows that smells bring back vivid memories faster than any of the other senses. Sometimes smells are evident and obvious (especially if it’s odorous). But sometimes visitors might need to be prompted to identify a smell. “What do you smell right now? What does it remind you of?” – might be questions we’d need to ask our guests as a prompt for them to talk about their experiences and make a connection to their present location.

Taste is a favourite sense when interpreting food. What can we do during a walk, talk or tour to safely engage our guests? If on a tour where the smells of food are making mouths water, is there a way to get a sample of what is cooking? It helps to know the chef or shopkeeper at a locale you will be passing to connect with your guests via a short chat or – better still – a tasty sample. You will provide a memorable connection for your guests, your guests will get a sample of something delicious, and the restaurant or shop might get some business later. A win for all!

We know that smell and taste might be the easier senses to access for telling the many stories of food. But what about sight, sound or touch? How do we make a connection to food using these senses? Think about the views your guests might have on a walk, talk or tour that focus directly on the food you are interpreting. Ensure your guests can see the action of food preparation at a market, the tossing of fish from a boat or the “dance” an expressive chef makes when he or she has an audience.

What sounds does food make? What sound does a ripe watermelon make at the produce stand? Would your guests know? Think about the sounds of olives shaken off a tree or the songs sung by winery workers as they process the grapes. The food is not making a sound but the sound is associated with the food. As a good interpreter, it’s your role to alert your guests to these sounds for them to make connections.

And touch? If you have a group in an agricultural area, it is easier to get guests to touch something that makes a connection to the actual plant, grain, fruit or vegetable (the firmness of a melon, for example). But in a market, asking a stall owner about the ripeness of their product might solicit an invitation to touch that a guest might be reluctant to ask for if they were on their own.

The Gastronomic Heritage Team hopes to gather more ideas about interpreting food and develop a set of powerful practices to support you in the interpretation of food. Stay tuned!

Chuck Lennox, owner of Lennox Insites (www.lennoxinsites.com), is a visitor experience consultant based in Seattle, WA (USA). You can reach him at: chuck@lennoxinsites.com.

To cite this article: Lennox, Chuck(2021) ‘ Interpreting food with your guests’ in Interpret Europe Newsletter 2-2021, 10.

Available online: https://interpret-europe.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/Newsletter-Summer-2021.pdf

About 30 members took part and to warm up an unseasonably chilly April day we exchanged our home interiors for an open space in Pompeii as the zoom meeting background. We kicked off with a couple of short presentations, then divided into breakout groups to discuss the question and ended with summaries from each group. The event was moderated by David Masters of Imagemakers (UK). Niall Phillips of Purcell Architects (UK) kindly joined us as guest speaker, presenting the planning for the museum of flight, Aerospace Bristol, as an example of good collaborative planning. This was followed by an example full of missed opportunities presented by Angus Forbes.

It was fascinating to hear participants’ professional experiences and informed viewpoints on this subject. Fitting together the pieces of the puzzle afterwards provides the following picture.

Ideally, interpretation is already considered in the procurement stage and has been stipulated in the funding programme if there is one. The consultants charged with writing the brief or competition document for the architects and designers have included it in their requirements.

In smaller projects, the interpretive input is in the hands of the architect or designer, so it is essential that they understand and are enthusiastic about the opportunities provided by heritage interpretation. Heritage projects form only a fraction of commissions given to architecture offices. For most of them, interpretive planning will be an approach they can learn about and occasionally apply rather than a specialisation.

The client might have commissioned an interpretive planner to establish the main narratives in advance, perhaps in the form of an interpretive masterplan. Public clients, recognising heritage interpretation’s potential as a motor for community development, social integration and reconciliation, will choose to run an interpretive form of public participation. If the budget allows for it, an interpretive planner will sit alongside architects, designers and engineers in a design team. If the design team is truly collaborative, ideas are worked on together and creative synergies enable the whole to be more than the sum of its parts.

If it isn’t, wasted money, poor design, inappropriate solutions and lost opportunities result. Examples of poor collaborative planning may put clients off taking this approach. Both the client and the architect may also feel threatened in their authority by an additional planner keen to influence the central premises of the project. Interpretive planning may be seen as adding extra expense, work and complications to a project both during the planning process and later, when there is no more funding available for follow-up.

An interpretive masterplan can however hold things together and facilitate decisions by providing clear narrative threads for the project.

In conclusion, there seems to be no consensus yet on the best way to integrate heritage interpretation into planning projects. One thing for sure is that Interpret Europe needs to think hard about how to reach out to funding directors, clients, brief writing consultants, architects and designers and to convince them of the advantages of incorporating heritage interpretation into their planning process.

Angus Forbes is IE’s Architects Coordinator and moderates the Interpret Europe Architecture Group on Facebook. Originally from Scotland, UK, he now lives and works in Germany as a landscape architect. He can be contacted at: angus.forbes@interpret-europe.net.

To cite this article: Forbes, Angus (2021) ‘How is interpretive planning best integrated into collaborative projects?’ in Interpret Europe Newsletter 2-2021, 9.

Available online: https://interpret-europe.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/Newsletter-Summer-2021.pdf

We mentioned last time that we were working on refreshing the IE website. We are pleased to announce that it is now live. Please take time to have a look around our new online home. There is an interactive map on which you can search for trainers in your area. We will be adding more content and a special area for members soon.

The web address remains the same as before: www.interpret-europe.net.

Let us know at office@interpret-europe.net if you find something is not quite right or if you cannot see what you are looking for.

We also trialled a new online event, Thematic tables, run by Janja Sivec, around which several members gathered once each month for an hour-or-so of lively exchange. The topics were mostly organised and hosted by our subject coordinators, plus special guest presenters, and provided a great opportunity for more of you to get to know each other whilst investigating and debating some interesting heritage interpretation questions.

The events were held on Zoom and livestreamed to the IE Facebook group where some members chose to watch the live debate. The events were also recorded so that members could watch later for up to a week after the event. You can find reviews of a couple of the recent table discussions in this newsletter.

We will take a break during the summer and hope to resume this monthly event later in the year so keep an eye open for news about the next one/s if you’d like to get involved.

To cite this article: IE News Team (2021) ‘Keeping active online’ in Interpret Europe Newsletter 2-2021, 8.

Available online: https://interpret-europe.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/Newsletter-Summer-2021.pdf

You can register here.

The pandemic will change travel. Is this the end of tourism as we know it?
Tourism associations are encouraging the sector to use the crisis to move towards the transformation to greener and more sustainable practices. At IE, we believe we could contribute to this through heritage interpretation. To make heritage more meaningful to people and people more mindful towards heritage can become the key concept for the transformation of society. However, are all those involved in tourism open for any sort of transformation?

– Is tourism ready to contribute to society, or is the economic aspect still too dominant?
– What sorts of experiences will people seek in the post-pandemic world?
– What will be the priorities of the destinations and their local communities in terms of tourism development/ tourism re-creation?
– What could bridge us, interpreters, to the tourism sector? Could we inspire each other to action?

This meeting aims to enlighten us about the new reality of tourism and to inspire us to reflect upon new concepts that engage heritage interpretation. How can we, together, advocate heritage interpretation as a tool for change?

As  IE members you are welcome to join us on Zoom (registration needed) or follow the livestream in the IE members group on Facebook. We would like to enable all IE members who miss the date to watch the video later. By registering you agree that the discussion is livestreamed in the IE members (only) group on Facebook where it will be available for one week.

Join us and share your views, experiences and thoughts.