Wordsworth Grasmere, a visitor attraction in the Lake District, has announced a series of immersive experiences and a new cafe as part of its plans to move towards “a more sustainable future”.
The attraction includes Dove Cottage, where the poet William Wordsworth and his family lived from 1799 to 1808, as well as a cottage-garden and museum.
Ahead of the summer period, the service has announced a number of immersive, digital and other income-boosting initiatives to engage contemporary visitors with the writer’s life and words and the surrounding Cumbrian landscape.
Among these is a Minecraft game, created in partnership with Lancaster University, designed to appeal to younger visitors. Litcraft offers a number of digital experiences, including ice skating across a frozen Grasmere lake and building treehouses.
Elsewhere, a free location-based app, Dorothy Wordsworth Walks, is being provided for walkers around the Grasmere and Rydal areas. The app notifies users when they reach a location mentioned in Wordsworth’s sister’s journals and provides video and audio content related to the siblings and their works.
Within Dove Cottage, a new audio experience will recreate domestic sounds such as crackling fires, quill pens scratching across paper, rainfall on the slate roof, and horse-drawn carriages passing by.
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In the museum, themed soundscapes have been developed for each exhibition space including a listening wall where visitors can place their ear against specific points to hear whispered poetry, snippets of conversation, or natural sounds that connect Wordsworth’s words to the landscape that inspired them.
The cafe has also been refurbished and is open to visitors and non-visitors selling local produce and Cumbrian products.
The ticketed site opens seven days a week during the summer period, closing on Sunday and Monday out of season. It is run by the charity the Wordsworth Trust, which was founded in 1891 after a public appeal to buy Dove Cottage.