The idea for Worcester Life Stories (WLS) was developed by two friends; Dr. Natasha Lord, Lead Clinical Psychologist for Older People’s Mental Health at Herefordshire and Worcestershire Health and Care NHS Trust and Sheena Payne-Lynn, Historic Environment Records Officer at Worcester City Council with a passion for old photos, inclusion and bringing people together through digital memories and thus the Worcester Life Stories project was formed.

The project, led by Herefordshire and Worcestershire Health and Care NHS Trust and Worcester City Council, became a collaborative initiative bringing local people and stakeholders together through shared stories of the City of Worcester, with funding thanks to National Lottery players.

As part of the project, two websites have been developed; Life Stories Herefordshire and Worcestershire and Know Your Place Worcester.

Life Stories Herefordshire and Worcestershire

The Life Stories Herefordshire and Worcestershire platform has been funded by the Trust and VerseOne (developer, through their innovation fund). It has been developed with the public through a series of online workshops that took place throughout 2020.

The platform allows people to create their own digital life story by uploading images, text, video and audio and is fully customisable. The life story remains private to the author unless they wish to invite others to view, contribute or oversee their book/s. It can also be downloaded as a PDF or shown as a video slideshow.

As evidence has shown, developing life stories promotes wellbeing and inclusion, especially for older people and people living with dementia and allows people to come together over shared memories and experience. Initial Life story research also suggests that digital life stories may be even more powerful in triggering memories and enhancing relationships. As part of the project, research is being undertaken exploring the impact of the platform in two areas; heritage and wellbeing (Association of Dementia Studies) and Communication and connectedness within families (University of Manchester).

Know Your Place Worcester

The second website, Know Your Place Worcester is a free online platform, funded by the Heritage National Lottery Fund, which gives access to hundreds of archive photos, historic maps and pieces of data about Worcester, helping people to rekindle memories by looking at archive photos of streets, shops and prominent places. It will also be a powerful tool for anyone who wants to research family history, explore local archaeology or find out about how previous generations lived in their street or neighbourhood.

Know Your Place Worcester will give people a new, easy-to-use tool to find out more about their local area, reconnect with their past and explore the city’s rich heritage and users will also be able to contribute their own knowledge, memories and images to the ‘Know Your Place Worcester’, ensuring that the content will grow and become relevant to an increasing number of people.