EU UNESCO4ALL TOUR
Content submitted by X23 Srl – Marika Mazzi Boém
Submited Date : 25/05/2020
Media Library

The EU UNESCO4ALL TOUR is an innovative, experiential, inclusive and transnational cultural tourism product combining together different but common UNESCO cultural WH sites in Europe by a thematic narrative logic. The tourism packages are fully focused on UNESCO built heritage and in particular on churches, monasteries and cathedrals, thus according to a "spiritual" narrative logic (“The Soul of Europe”) and addressed to - but not limited to - people with visual impairments, but ultimately including all kind of audiences according to the "designed4all" approach. They will all have the opportunity to access the arts and to experience the outstanding value of the UNESCO cultural heritage sites as never before both in museums and on site.

Given the focus on UNESCO WH sites, the tourism product will also target the accessible tourism market: for this purpose, a specialised training to museums staffs in the field of the management of UNESCO WH sites and accessible tourism is provided, thus creating a multiplier effect for the adoption of the same good practice by other museums in Europe. The tourism packages are built on disruptive innovation making art accessible to the blind and visually impaired. The technology integrates tactile exploration with audio data, which is provided by an International company, leader in audio guides for cultural purposes. Currently tactile models are the way through which the blind and visually impaired people perceive the artworks and cultural heritage. The models, however, are per se “dumb”, so an audio guide or a human guide is necessary to integrate tactile perception with verbal information. We will therefore solve the problem by transforming tactile models of artworks into speaking models, thus allowing an interactive and independent exploration from people with visual disabilities.

We are interested in starting the commercialisation of the tourism packages and to further include museums and UNESCO WH in the network so that we can progressively open up the access to UNESCO WH sites in Europe and beyond to people with visual impairments and the blinds. We are therefore looking for DMOs, museums, UNESCO WH site management authorities to join as but ultimately to tourism service providers interested to join us for receiving the UNESCO4ALL quality label specifically designed.
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