Cultural Strategy

Through harnessing our creativity and cultural assets we want to create:

• A place where people of all ages and backgrounds can experience quality culture on their doorstep; be creative, entertained, inspired and challenged.
• A place to learn new skills and find rewarding careers; or simply socialise and play, feel fulfilled and breathe fresh air.
• A place with a distinct and positive identity where people and creative enterprises want to put down their roots, grow and blossom.

Our key challenges and opportunities are to:

• Harness our natural, arts and heritage assets to define our distinctiveness and increase our cultural profile
• Be ambitious for our cultural venues and support them in delivering quality
• Provide the kind of cultural environment that attracts young people and skilled workers
• Provide high quality, sustainably designed buildings that allow new and existing communities to create distinct neighbourhoods

The priority objectives to address these challenges are to:

• Articulate a narrative that tells the story of our landscape, independent history and cultural heritage that will give our district a strong identity that people can relate to and find compelling
• Germinate and grow sustainable arts and cultural venues as hubs that foster excellence in the region
• Enable our creative sector to input influence and shape our built environment and public realm
• Enrich our public realm by joining up our green spaces, waterways, parks and play spaces, planting more street trees and woodlands and managing our water imaginatively with wetlands and rain gardens for recreation, tourism and wildlife

Our key challenges and opportunities are to enable:

• Fair access to culture for all communities across our area and for all people regardless of socio-economic background, gender identity, sexuality, disability or ethnicity
• Young people to gain employment skills for the industries of the future, find creative pathways and fulfilling careers
• Everyone to lead an active, healthier and happier life.
• Creatively-inclined returners or unemployed workers to retrain for work in the cultural sector or creative industries and set up creative micro-businesses.

The priority objectives to address these challenges are to:

• Support our creative, arts and heritage sectors so they are able to provide quality cultural experiences for people of all ages and backgrounds
• Provide the cultural activity young people want and need and offer them pathways to creative careers
• Attract entrepreneurs to support greater numbers of start-ups and nurture innovation and collaboration amongst the business and cultural community
• Encourage healthy, active lifestyles and positive emotional wellbeing by harnessing the power of nature and creativity. For example, we can use the arts to drive engagement with our beautiful landscape and treasured blue and green spaces (many of which are art forms in their own right!) – something which can boost physical and mental health, strengthen the desire to protect our environment while also inspiring creativity.
• Work with and support our creative and cultural sector, enabling input into the design and delivery of projects that enhance the public realm and offer health and wellbeing benefits

Our key challenges and opportunities are to:

• Create a dynamic and prosperous district founded on knowledge, culture and business
• Facilitate the growth of the creative industries and arts and heritage sector
• Provide better visitor experiences and strengthened evening economy through a broad range of cultural offers
• Ensure a better quality of life for people in the round, beyond what can be measured by GDP

The priority objectives to address these challenges are to:

• Value health and wellbeing as well as GDP ensuring people can access the cultural experiences they need to bloom and prosper
• Ensure that the Covid Economic Recovery and Growth Plan for the County and our District supports the Cultural sector and Creative Economy to restart, revitalise and grow – through activities and interventions that: support employment, skills and economic inclusion; help business and the sector to grow and become more productive; provide the infrastructure needed to enable growth; create attractive places and homes to live in.
• Be bold, ambitious and strategic and invest in our cultural assets, and work with other building or land owners to make sure the needs of creative enterprises are considered
• Attract entrepreneurs to support greater numbers of start-ups and stimulate innovation and collaboration amongst the business and cultural sector
• Ensure equality of access to quality creative and cultural experiences for communities and audiences across Somerset West and Taunton