Historic environment and heritage management projects, resources, commentary and analysis by Profs Ian Baxter (Heriot-Watt University) & David Gill (UEA)
The RSA Heritage Index, issued in the autumn of 2020, provides information on heritage at risk for each local authority. It is possible to quantify each local and unitary authority. For example, in Suffolk there are 8 Grade I, 22 Grade II*, and 3 Grade II buildings at risk; in addition, there are 25 scheduled monuments at risk.
Turning the numbers into a percentage, it is possible to see that Norfolk has a particularly high percentage of Grade I buildings at risk. Cambridgeshire has a high percentage of scheduled monuments at risk.
The pandemic has affected the jobs market and career paths for many already working in the heritage sector, whether as a result of organisational crisis or operational response to Covid resulting in furlough, job reduction or loss, and the need for reskilling and resilience building on a personal and professional level to manage a way through a year of uncertainty.
There is a further group of aspiring workers trying to enter or develop their career within the sector: 2 years’ worth of students who graduated in 2020 and those about to graduate in the summer or autumn of 2021 are also searching for opportunities and advice. I’m currently working on an updated version of the Heritage Careers Guide published in late 2019 in association with BEFS and The Heritage Alliance, and am reviewing the best places to go to for advice and jobs listings, as well as gathering some excellent resources which have appeared over the past year as a result of Covid-19 to support professional development and up- or re-skilling. I’m also cognisant of the aims of organisations such as Fair Museum Jobs to support a healthy, equal and supportive employment environment in the sector, and am hoping to include some commentary from the FMJ team on what to look for in an employer.
In the meantime before the new guide appears here, some useful updated advice and resources have been made available on the Museums Association website, and UCL’s Careers Service has produced a specific podcast recording of a panel discussion with really useful perspectives on jobs and recruitment in the Museums, Arts & Cultural Heritage sector (see Episode 2).
Catching up on various aspects of heritage organisations’ governance and corporate planning in advance of the 2020 annual reports publication season meant I was reading again through The National Trust’s 2019-20 annual report which was published just as the coronavirus pandemic forced the country into lockdown just over a year ago.
The 2019-2020 financial year had been the most successful ever for the Trust in terms of visitor numbers, membership recruitment and retention and fundraising. These successes also coincided with the Trust celebrating its 125th anniversary and the half way point through its 10 year strategy ‘Playing our Part’. As with all good corporate planning cycles, the midway point gave the Trust the opportunity to review progress and refine the strategy and it took the opportunity to relaunch it under the banner of ‘Nature, beauty and history. For everyone, for ever.’
The revised focus for the strategy has been all the more important given the year of lockdown which immediately followed the annual report publication – with aims for environmental enhancement, further broadening of the experience for visitors, and most potently “…addressing unequal access to nature, beauty and history by working with others to increase access to parks and green spaces in, around and near urban areas.”
The effect of the pandemic has been huge on the organisation as widely reported elsewhere, with anticipated effects already noted in the published annual report prior to the realisation of the year of turmoil from 2020 into 2021. The upcoming corporate reporting for 2020-21 will therefore prove fascinating reading not only for an overarching assessment by the organisation on how it has coped with pandemic’s huge effects on it as a charity and employer with major reliance on the tourism economy, but also how it feels it has corporately fared through the media storm of culture wars, the organisation’s response to the Black Lives Matter movement, and its role in addressing the identified social need for connection and access to greenspace, fresh air and a healthy natural environment.
The publication of an annual report, apart from being a statutory requirement for accounting and governance purposes, are the location where fact (accounts and KPIs) and narrative (report and review) combine in a regular annual cycle enabling the lifecycle and development of an organisation to be charted. They are a vital and fascinating part of the story in an organisation’s administrative history, and are always worth a closer inspection.
The impact of lockdowns due to the pandemic is making itself clear on the visitor figures released by ALVA. Reduced visitor numbers will see a reduction in income from ticket sales as well as through retail outlets. We have yet to see the impact on those who pay annual memberships.
The 44 properties represented in this histogram received over 20 million visitors in 2019; in 2020 it was just over 6 million. The Top 10 properties for HES dropped by nearly 4 million visitors.
This ‘R.A.C. Road Sign’ created by Burrow of the Kingsway in London outlines some of the key heritage sites around Dorchester, the Roman Durnovaria, including the ‘Prehistoric Camp’ at Poundbury, and the ‘Great Prehistoric Earthworks’ at Maiden Castle.
One of the last heritage sites I visited in London prior to lockdown was the Tower of London (for the Heritage Alliance conference). ALVA has now released the visitor numbers for three of their properties in London: the Tower, Hampton Court Palace, and Kensington Palace. The combined number of visitors in 2019 was 4.5 million; in 2019 it fell to 730,816.
The new English Heritage guidebook for the Cluniac priory at Wenlock adopts the new format for the series: a nearly square design that makes it easier to use on site than the previous tall format.
There are two main sections: the tour followed by a history. There are six ‘special features’ (what I would describe as information boxes) that include one on the Cluniac Order, and archaeology at the priory. The all colour guide includes a number of reconstructions, such as one for the chapter house, and an aerial view of the complex. (I miss the drama and atmosphere of an Alan Sorrell reconstruction!) The later history of the priory is included down to its placement in State Guardianship in 1962.
The guide by John McNeill includes a foldout plan inside the back cover, and a labelled photograph of the site on the folded out front cover. Both will help the visitor to understand the different parts of the monastic complex.
1965
The first Ministry guide to the site was by Rose Graham and was entitled ‘The history of the Alien Priory of Wenlock’ (1965). This reproduced her essay from the Journal of the British Archaeological Association (1939).
The Hellenistic Statistical Service released the visitor numbers for archaeological sites in Greece today (31 March 2021). They cover the period up to the end of September and show a fall of 79.8 per cent due to the pandemic: a fall from 11.2 million visitors in 2019 to 2.2 million visitors in 2020. Olympia saw the largest fall with just over 85 per cent. Overall this represents a fall of some 9 million visitors for the period to the end of September. It also represents a drop of 84.2 per cent of income through ticket sales: from just over 90 million Euros in 2019, to 14.2 million Euros in 2020.
The Hellenic Statistical Service released the latest visitor numbers for museums in Greece today (31 March 2021). Although the numbers are only available up to the end of September 2020, they show a drop of 79.5% due to the pandemic. The Archaeological Museum in Herakleion showed a drop of over 90 per cent. The January-September comparison between 2019 and 2020 shows the impact: a fall from 4.7 million visitors to 976,805. (In 2019 there were 5.8 million visitors to museums in Greece.) This is reflected in a decrease of ticket sales of 82 per cent: from 19.2 million Euros in 2019 to 3.4 million Euros in 2020.
The publication of the ALVA visitor figures for museums in London demonstrates the impact of COVID restrictions. A selection of 11 museums in London received over 36.6 million visitors in 2019, reduced to 8.2 million in 2020. This represents lost income that will need to be addressed by the sector.
