The challenge
The LEADER Partnership wanted to encourage local people to focus on their town’s heritage, with a view to developing heritage-related projects that would benefit the community.
Our response
We worked closely with groups in Thomastown, Graiguenamanagh, Gorwan and Callan.
We ran two informal community heritage-mapping workshops in each town to identify and celebrate the cultural and heritage value of their towns.
We provided training in heritage communication skills, including guided walk leadership.
Each community then developed and hosted a “Showcasing our Town” event with one of the other groups as their guests. These were very enjoyable days (despite the rain) and helped to build the inter-community links that were an important outcome of the project.
Finally we supported the group in developing proposals for a heritage-based community project (such as an interpretive trail or a community event) and a well-planned application for LEADER funding.
