The records we create from our research can become crucial management tools to better inform planning and conservation processes, thus ensuring that future generations will be able to enjoy our precious heritage as much as we do.
To this end, it is important that we develop links with Historic Environment Records (HERs). HERs are used by planners within our local planning authorities to help make planning decisions and also to help direct funding grants for conservation work, so it is important to get your research into this local record. Contact details for your local HER can be found here. We also encourage researchers to make their work available through OASIS, which can connect to HERs.
In addition, several County Gardens Trusts (CGTs) are currently writing Statements of Significance for their parks and gardens; such documents are recognised nationally and are extremely important for helping professionals to make better management decisions affecting these landscapes. Remember that you probably know your local parks and gardens better than your planning authority staff, so lodging Statements of Significance with your HER is really useful in their protection.
The ultimate outcome of all our research, survey and documentation should be the preparation of Conservation Management Plans (CMPs) for each individual site. These are valuable tools for developing informed management strategies for historic designed landscapes and typically include research on a site’s history, development and surviving state, as well as setting out specific conservation measures and how these will be funded. Taken together CMPs form a sizeable body of material on the UK’s historic designed landscapes.
We offer training and support on research and recording at our Resource Hub.