I wrote this as a goodbye message to my colleagues at the National Trust for Scotland. It sums up what, to me, makes for a meaningful visitor experience. People talk more and more about creating ‘wow factors’. For me wow factors are very often there already, even if they are sometimes hidden. The trick is to let them sing.
The real thing …
Cannot be recreated in plastic, or timber or projected
through 3d glasses.
Is here in this place only, and now with you alone.
Can take you time travelling, or on other imaginative journeys.
Should be honoured yet not stifled.
Loses its shine as soon as it is packaged up and sold.
Is the twinkle in the eye of a specialist caught up in a story that
no-one else could ever care so passionately about.
Is the heart-stopping moment when you find yourself eye to eye with a roe deer in a woodland.
Is the humbling sense of mortality that comes from thinking about, or unearthing lives long gone.
Is the deeply personal connection that is unlocked by touching a historic object or photograph that
someone just like you once treasured.
Is your jaw literally dropping as the view of the loch unfolds.
Is the quiet joy of watching a true craftsman at work.
Is something a true artist or poet will find ways to reveal
Is reaching the top of the hill. What else could you achieve?
Is taking in beautiful artworks and buildings and feeling all the more beautiful for it.
Is thinking, look at that – maybe I could try that.
Is feeling wide-eyed and childlike as you realise there are always new things to learn.
Is fire in the belly when you do something brave. When you stand up for your principles.
Is a eureka moment when everyone in the room nods … ‘ok. It’s crazy but it could work!’
Is in a happy memory, in a tear, in laughter.
Is the pride in knowing that whatever you made,
was made with love.
December 9th 2016
Josephine Anthony 