Cultural Destinations programme

Arts Council England recently announced the sixteen successful bidding consortia of the 2^nd round of its Cultural Destinations programme. The fund aims to help the cultural and tourism sectors to work together more effectively to grow local visitor economies.

We are thrilled that our advice and support directly informed three of the successful bids: Potteries Museum & Art Gallery (Stoke-on-Trent), Marketing Manchester and Spike Island (South West).

Starting on local ground, we have been working with Marketing Manchester for the last seven years to create partnerships with the cultural and tourism sectors through a range of initiatives. This funding will help us to develop the innovative Culture Hosts platform that we have piloted in Manchester, extending its reach with cultural and hospitality partners to make sure visitor-facing staff are well informed about what’s happening in the city.

We’re looking forward to working with Stoke-on-Trent partners to create new opportunities to collaborate and extend the visitor offer in a city that is gearing up to bid for UK City of Culture 2021. And we are delighted that the Spike Island programme will continue and extend its ground-breaking work to connect Bristol & Bath culturally, across the South West region. We have mentored the project since the programme began two years ago, and are currently delivering a dynamic series of digital optimisation workshops with cultural and tourism partners across the two cities.