Dr Dorothy Fox

Visiting a garden that is open to the public is a popular leisure activity of many people in England and yet there is a dearth of research literature on the practice of visiting gardens. Two studies have identified why people visit, but by concentrating on motivation and hence human agency, they have disregarded the actions of social and material agents on the decision-making process. This paper reports the findings of a study into visiting pay-to-visit gardens in the South of England. A self-completion questionnaire was delivered to a cluster sample of residents in Southern England in 2002 to ascertain their preferences for visiting attractions in general and visiting gardens specifically. Interviews were then carried out with volunteers from the survey and with visitors to horticultural attractions to obtain a greater understanding of this phenomenon. Few visitors to gardens are there on their own and so either both or all of the individuals in a group were interviewed together. T...

RELAYS (Regional Educational Legacy in Arts and Youth Sport) is one of the programmes designed to create a positive and lasting legacy beyond 2012. Funded by Legacy Trust UK, an independent charity set up to build a lasting cultural and sporting legacy from the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games and the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE), it is supported by a range of partners, including 13 of the region’s universities (Universities South West, 2010). Here the partnership formed by the RELAYS School Events Coordinator, and the Events and Sports Management tutors from the School of Services Management at Bournemouth University is described. Through this collaboration, opportunities are being created to enhance the student experience both within the curricula and external to it, throughout the period of study.

Curriculum innovation in higher education is often directed at efficiency; however, this paper reports a small change in the curriculum which was designed to enhance student employability. Central to the learning and assessment of an undergraduate Events Management unit is that the students, in groups, organise a real event. In the academic year 2008-09, ‘clients’ were sought for each group, for whom the students could act as consultants in the organisation of an event. Communication skills in relation to consultancy were a particular emphasis of the innovation, which was evaluated using an action research methodology. Data, collected during the year, suggested that just over half of the cohort believed the approach was helping them to obtain a 40 week industrial placement for the following year. Furthermore, about three-quarters of the students felt that it would be beneficial in employment, first, during their placement (30% indicated it would be very useful) and secondly, after g...

Whilst for many nations progressing a sustainable development agenda is a priority, for others, conserving their existing socio-natural heritage in a sustainable way may be significant. In the United Kingdom, the National Trust, a charitable organisation, supports its extensive conservation role through a wide-ranging programme of events each year. This study explores the various ways in which these events have been developed to contribute to sustainable heritage conservation. The method for this case study consisted of the collection and analysis of both primary and secondary data. The former obtained through in-depth interviews with key personnel within the National Trust, with secondary data from National Trust and other sources used in support. The findings show the Trust’s events play a vital role in educating the public in sustainability, in respect of both natural and cultural heritage. The interview participants revealed that the events are conceived in two main ways – first...

Amidst claims that the use of mixed methods research is in the ascendancy (Brannen, 2005) much has been written defining mixed methods research itself, defining the types of mixed methods research and arguing the case for or against it. However, perhaps because academic journals tend to be discipline-based and often incline towards particular research paradigms, there are few examples demonstrating how the elements of a mixed method design were selected. In this chapter it is shown how a proposed two-phase mixed methods study was subsequently adapted to four phases to meet the changing circumstances of a cultural tourism research project. In doing so, a novel approach to interviewing was required and the method selected, drawn from ethnography, is described in detail.

Visiting. a garden in England is a traditional leisure activity that continues to grow in popularity but curiously this sector of the visitor attraction market has received little attention from academics. The thesis seeks to understand participation in garden visiting from a number of perspectives but principally that of the visitor. It moves beyond the established approach of individual agency with its assumption of free choice to incorporate social and material agency. This movement requires a shift in theoretical perspective from the prevailing theories in the leisure literature (motivational theories) to the emerging theory of affordance. The study consisted of four phases of data collection. Two phases obtained quantitative data from surveys - first, of residents in Dorset and secondly, visitors in a garden. The aim was to identify garden visitors and to establish the importance of various factors in influencing a visit. The other two phases obtained qualitative data from a se...

Over the past decade or so, events have become key elements in strategic marketing initiatives with event marketing or, as it is sometimes known, live or experiential marketing, dominating some promotional budgets. The aims of these initiatives are not only to drive sales, but also to increase brand awareness, loyalty and image. Brands provide the basis for differentiation between competitive offerings and are often conceived in terms of the consumer’s perspective or that of the brand owner; other definitions refer to purpose or characteristics. A traditional perspective therefore is of a brand created by the marketer but Grant (2006) suggests that brands are built up of a number of interconnected cultural ideas, which he conceives as a brand molecule. The brand therefore develops from the reception and enculturation of the associated aspects of the brand and is therefore a co-creation between marketer, audience and wider society. Grant gives the example of 501 s - Levi’s flagship b...

This research extends understanding of consumer-decision making in the hotel selection process through an exploratory study which reports the findings of a survey of English residents (n = 350) to ascertain the importance of hotel or resort gardens. Some previous studies have included the landscaping as a variable, but most have not. This study demonstrates that many respondents always choose or try to choose a hotel with a garden when selecting a domestic hotel or one abroad. Furthermore it is unique in identifying that walking in the garden is the most preferred activity and that very colourful flowers have greatest appeal, irrespective of the location of the hotel. Whilst a garden is not a key requirement of guests, the costs of development and ongoing maintenance suggests that the garden requires greater consideration in the design, operation and marketing of hotels and resorts than has previously been considered and this study therefore enhances the ongoing development of under...

The National Trust was founded in 1895 for ‘the preservation of places of historic interest or natural beauty’. While the distinction between the cultural and the natural seemed obvious at that time and members and visitors were not even implicated actors, we argue that the National Trust may be better understood as a co-constructed network effect of the social and material, which in turn affords social-material agency. There are currently 3.5 million members of the National Trust and 50 million visitors every year to National Trust properties, which include the largest collection of gardens in the world and over 300 historic houses and open-air properties. While the notion of design itself may seem to be an exemplar of the humanist love of agency, we argue (following Latour) that traditional notions of agency, which were asymmetrically distributed to the human actors, take insufficient cognisance of evident occasions of ‘material agency’ (Pickering, 1995) and the site of conservati...

This study examines participation in garden visiting from a number of perspectives but principally that of the visitor. It concentrated on what lay behind the decision to visit gardens rather than the experiential aspects of a visit. It therefore moved beyond the established approach of individual agency, with its assumption of free choice, to incorporate social and material agency.

There is a growing body of literature that discusses the protection of the natural environment in relation to events and festivals. However, there is little that demonstrates the value of nature to event stakeholders. This research contributes by recognising the natural environment as an agent in the design and operation of the Bournemouth Air Festival, which is held on land, sea and in the air. The case study was undertaken iteratively and within an inductive approach drawing on multiple sources of evidence, namely in-depth and unstructured interviews with stakeholders; observation and documentary evidence. In the absence of a theoretical proposition, the analytical strategy adopts a multi-disciplinary approach to develop a case description. The study reveals first, the value of natural capital to the Festival and secondly, it develops a new model demonstrating the variability of the natural environment as an agent in the design and operation of the event. This shows that changes i...

ABSTRACT Abstract A prevalent social discourse concerning climate change, loss of biodiversity and the importance of nature to human health currently dominates news articles, television programmes and political comment. These anthropogenic impacts on the natural environment question humankind’s predominant relationship with nature; particularly in western developed cultures where people are usually perceived as separate from nature rather than part of it. Whilst the world’s declining iconic species catch media attention, it is often local and indigenous wildlife that become the focus of communities at a local level. As a result, conservation organisation membership has increased over the last 5 years alongside a strong retail sector which encourages people to purchase, for example, wild bird food, bird feeders and nest boxes. As interest in feeding the wild birds that visit gardens has increased, so too has an appreciation of the need to conserve the wider aspects of the ecosystem such as plants, insects and amphibians which attract and support the birds and mammals that have become more welcome visitors to our gardens. There is also increasing recognition of the health and psychological benefits that wildlife gardening can bring to individuals and communities. Many prominent garden attractions and horticultural shows in England and throughout the world have developed a wild theme into their garden design which has captured the imagination of garden visitors who wish to marry their love of horticulture with their interest in wildlife. Such naturalistic and wild flower planting has thus become a more common element of home garden design reflected in the retail sector, media programmes and garden magazines and books.

Aims This chapter introduces the range of gardens that are presented to the public as visitor attractions, the popularity of which continues to increase. The complexity of managing such outdoor sites, which in the majority of cases were not initially developed or designed to receive large numbers of visitors, is discussed. Also discussed are some of the factors that influence an individual's decision to visit a garden. The specific aims of this chapter are to: ● provide an overview of garden-based visitor attractions, ● identify and characterize the visitors to gardens, and ● examine the issues involved in managing sites which are both natural and social spaces and which were not initially developed as visitor attractions.

Over the past decade or so, events have become key elements in strategic marketing initiatives with event marketing or, as it is sometimes known, live or experiential marketing, dominating some promotional budgets. The aims of these initiatives are not only to drive sales, but also to increase brand awareness, loyalty and image. Brands provide the basis for differentiation between competitive offerings and are often conceived in terms of the consumer's perspective or that of the brand owner; other definitions refer to purpose or characteristics. A traditional perspective therefore is of a brand created by the marketer but Grant (2006) suggests that brands are built up of a number of interconnected cultural ideas, which he conceives as a brand molecule. The brand therefore develops from the reception and enculturation of the associated aspects of the brand and is therefore a co-creation between marketer, audience and wider society. Grant gives the example of 501 s -Levi's fla...

Whilst for many nations progressing a sustainable development agenda is a priority, for others, conserving their existing socio-natural heritage in a sustainable way may be significant. In the United Kingdom, the National Trust, a charitable organisation, supports its extensive conservation role through a wide-ranging programme of events each year. This study explores the various ways in which these events have been developed to contribute to sustainable heritage conservation. The method for this case study consisted of the collection and analysis of both primary and secondary data. The former obtained through in-depth interviews with key personnel within the National Trust, with secondary data from National Trust and other sources used in support.

ABSTRACT Tea continues to be a popular beverage in the world. As a new niche tourism market, tea tourism has developed both in China and many other countries for decades, but academic research has lagged behind tea tourism development. This paper focuses on stakeholders' views of tourism development, their potential roles and concerns in the case of tea tourism in Xinyang prefecture of central China. Interviews and open ended questionnaires were conducted in 2007 and 2008. Qualitative analysis indicates the following: 1) According to stakeholders' view, tea tourism development in Xinyang failed despite many good tea tourism attractions, and better tea tourism planning, marketing and collaboration between stakeholders in Xinyang is required for successful tea tourism development; 2) Local government, tea garden owners, media, travel agencies and tea tourists are thought to be the principal stakeholders with different roles to develop tea tourism; 3) Collaboration between stakeholders is crucial for tea tourism development. The implications of the findings are discussed with a view to permit recommendations to be made.