Great Yarmouth Borough Heritage Strategy 2014
I am a Freelance Heritage and Audience Development Consultant who has been
commissioned by Great Yarmouth Borough Council to write a revised heritage strategy
for the Borough. The strategy follows on from strategies written in 1996 and 2004.
I’ve worked for range of heritage and cultural organisations and museums, focusing
mainly on audience development and how to reach both non-traditional and traditional
audiences. As well as undertaking freelance work, I am also in the second year of a PhD
which looks at how museum professionals decide which hard-to-reach groups to target
and work with.
The Council’s vision for heritage in Great Yarmouth is to enable its full potential to
develop, so that it can make the maximum possible contribution and enrich all aspects
of life in the Borough, for the benefit of local residents and visitors alike. The strategy
will produce a new vision to provide clarity of purpose, and to focus on audience
development and the social, economic role of Cultural Heritage.
DEFINITION OF CULTURAL HERITAGE
Cultural Heritage can be defined in many different ways. This strategy is a Cultural
Heritage Strategy, rather than an Arts and Cultural Heritage Strategy and, as such, will
focus on heritage. However, although not specifically focused on the arts, the strategy
will recognize the importance of the arts in helping people better understand, and
engage with, heritage, and, in particular, will look at links that are being, and can be,
made between the Borough’s heritage and arts organisations.
THE HERITAGE
The Borough of Great Yarmouth has a fascinating and diverse heritage that includes
amongst other things:
 Roman settlements
 Surviving medieval town walls
 Impressive maritime and entertainment history
 A history of being a popular tourist destination (since the 18th century)
 A fantastic collection of heritage sites, cultural venues and museums.
As part of the strategy, I will be pulling together several key themes that are linked to
the Borough’s tangible and intangible heritage, and that can be used as the basis for
heritage products, such as trails, apps or guide books. The themes will be used to group
together heritage sites and attractions to give a diverse offer, and, crucially, will be used
to help people make sense of the Borough’s diverse heritage. Key themes could include:
 Seaside holidays and entertainment
 Maritime history
 Community history
 Key people – famous and not-so-famous people
 Dark history e.g. witches, smugglers, body snatchers
 Industrial history
 Welcome to Great Yarmouth – a history of visitors and new residents to the
Borough, for example, Romans, sailors, fishergirls.
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THE STRATEGY
The strategy focuses on five key strands:
 Raising the profile of, and promoting, the Borough’s heritage to local people
and tourists, including day visitors and overnight visitors. This may include joint
marketing, high-profile events, use of a number of marketing channels including
print, web-based marketing and social media, and collecting more information
about visitors to the Borough to allow for tailored marketing approaches.
Heritage packages based on the key themes and targeted at specific audiences
(for example, families, history enthusiasts) might be suggested, for example,
guide books and trails that help people make sense of the Borough’s broad and
diverse heritage. The strategy will consider how organisations and local people
can support the promotion of the Borough’s heritage.
 Using information technology to help bring the heritage of the Borough to life,
to help people understand the Borough’s heritage, and to promote the
heritage offer. This may include, for example, a digital app, digital walking trails
or audioguides. An example of an app which helps people to understand both
tangible and intangible heritage is Soho Stories, a National Trust app that uses
GPS technology to know the street app users are on and plays snippets of oral
history or songs, or shows archive film and images, that relate to that street. The
app both guides people around Soho, acting as an orientation and mapping
device, and promotes the area’s heritage.
 Preserving the Borough’s heritage in a way that encourages economic, social
and environmental regeneration, including suggestions for ways in which to
enhance the historic environment to increase income and improve people’s
quality of life. Some of the suggestions will also be income generating.
 Empowering local residents to better understand and get involved with the
preservation and promotion of their local heritage via education, training and
volunteering. The Minster Cemeteries project, which has seen very hard-toreach local people who had previously engaged with their local heritage learn
preservation and conservation skills and help conserve the historic cemetery
provides an excellent example of how heritage can support people to learn skills
and improve their employability.
 It is recognized that more can be achieved by working together in partnership.
Therefore, partnership working between organisations to ensure that
organisations support each other, and so everyone works together to achieve
the aims of the strategy will also be a key strand of the strategy.
The strategy will include key objectives to meet between 2014 and 2019, as well as a
costed action plan that will set out priority actions for the next five years.
The strategy will also include a range of policies – key policies in relation to this group
are a Learning Policy and Community Engagement Policy.
CONSULTATION
Key to ensuring that the strategy is a document that reflects the views of stakeholders
and that is taken forward by everyone is in-depth consultation with stakeholders across
the Borough.
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I’m keen to discover:
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How your organisation can feed into what the strategy wants to achieve.
Where your organisation is now and what the strategy can help your
organisation deliver organisational goals.
What you feel are the main priorities for investment in the Borough’s heritage,
for example education, historic landscape, marketing.
How you feel organisations can work together to help achieve the strategy.
What you feel are the key actions and priorities that should, if possible, be
included in the strategy.
I’d like to take the opportunity to invite you all to contribute to the strategy. I’d
welcome any comments/ideas you would like to put forward. Please send these to me
via email to laura@lauracrossley.com. You can send as much or as little as you like and
bullet points are absolutely fine. In addition, I’m happy to arrange to meet either faceto-face or via telephone.
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