HODs RSS FeedCategory - Access
Showing blog posts in the category: Access.
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Making collections accessible to visually impaired visitors
Posted by Ben Goodwin on 23rd January 2012 | 1 Comment
Catering for differently abled people within arts and heritage venues is essential and rewarding but it can pose a challenge. At the Barber Institute of Fine Arts in Birmingham where I work, we are grateful for the support of our volunteers who have helped us improve our accessibility for those with visual impairment.
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Lifting the lid on disability history
Posted by Esther Gill on 16th January 2012 | 0 Comments
For many disabled people, the everyday experiences of their historical peers are rarely reflected in the stories that are told through local museums, heritage sites and events such as Heritage Open Days. In the past, and still today, disabled people were often educated separately at special schools and sometimes worked and spent their leisure time outside the mainstream. Their stories are not illuminated in our histories and generally remain hidden. I think that Heritage Open Days offers an exciting opportunity to change this, exploring an area of history that is not well known, linking with new audiences, and creating new events.
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Real people with real issues: Working with disabled volunteers
Posted by Esther Gill on 11th October 2011 | 0 Comments
I am currently pre-occupied by the generally enjoyable post-HODs activity of ‘reading the feedback’: positive, negative, insightful, useful, frustrating, well deserved. As part of this process I have been looking at the transcript of an interview with a Heritage Open Days volunteer from Gosport who is passionate and knowledgeable about local history, keen to use her skills and time on a worthwhile project and who also happens to be disabled.
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Truly open to all: a selection of accessible events on the South Coast
Posted by Esther Gill on 5th September 2011 | 0 Comments
As I venture into the world of blogging with my first Heritage Open Days post, I am wondering how I can pick out specific events that are accessible? Don’t we all aim to put on events that are ‘accessible, inclusive, open to all’? Isn’t this the ethos behind Heritage Open Days?
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Top tips for tip top entertainment: how a drama performance brought a coffin fittings works to life
Posted by Lucie Thacker on 16th August 2011 | 2 Comments
We didn’t decide to be dramatic – but Tin Box Theatre Company did. After many years of work and several turns of fortune, Birmingham Conservation Trust bought a semi-derelict Grade II* late 19th century manufactory on the edge of the Jewellery Quarter in Birmingham last year (with the aid of a grant from Birmingham City Council). The Coffin Fittings Works is a handsome red brick building, fronting the road and with two rear wings arranged around a courtyard. Without services and with boarded-up ground floor windows, the Coffin Fittings Works looked doomed to wait for the results of major fundraising before it was used again. Heritage Open Days were the only opportunity the public had to have a look inside and then the two Jo’s got in touch...
