Unique selling points

The combination of the following points make Thistledown a truly unique project.

	The unique concept
	The innovative approach
	The inspired vision for the future
	The wide appeal and accessibility for all
	The unique site

Concept
The concept of Thistledown is unique: a tourist and visitor destination designed to raise awareness and understanding of agricultural and environmental issues in order to effect change in consumer choices and actions. No other place will offer such a diverse range of experiences that explore the profound relationship between land and life.

Approach
No other centre uses the natural local environment together with innovative and wholly interlinked interactive and visual representations to help visitors to understand man’s impact on the environment and the resulting influence on global issues. The features at Thistledown have all been meticulously planned and designed to relate to the central concept, so the experience will stimulate the senses of smell, touch, taste, hearing and sight to engage the visitor fully, constantly interlinking ideas to promote the ethos of the centre.

Vision
Thistledown is a centre designed to educate and inform on many different levels, appealing to a diverse range of visitors. It has the potential to become a forum for debate and research in agricultural and environmental construction practice, offering not only the accommodation/venue but the natural focus for progressive and inspired thinking for the future too.

Operating at the forefront of agricultural practice, Thistledown will have the potential to positively influence local and national agriculture, as it leads by example to explore sustainable and revolutionary farming methods, in line with government expectations and targets.

Appeal and accessibility
Thistledown has been designed with education, enjoyment and accessibility in mind. It will, therefore, have a wide range of appeal – from young to old, from active to disabled, from individuals to groups, from the general public to experts in agricultural and environmental issues.

Information will be presented at different levels of interest throughout the centre and in attractive, innovative forms with which to engage. Physically disabled visitors will be able to enjoy the experience of a specifically designed boardwalk, whilst an interactive hide will enhance wildlife sounds for those hard of hearing and the sensory garden will excite visitors’ senses of touch and smell. Thistledown will also incorporate the latest technology to access the more secret areas of the natural environment such as birds’ nests, badgers sets and ponds, with infra-red cameras revealing night time activity for all.

Site
The Thistledown project is specific to its site. Central to Thistledown’s philosophy is to learn from the past to benefit our future by learning how man has integrated with nature over time. Thistledown Farm has a fascinating topographical and cultural heritage, including evidence of Bronze Age activity and Roman occupation and other early farming history.

Furthermore the site offers beautiful scenery and undiscovered views and is comprised of a unique combination of habitats to study and explore within a traditional farm boundary in the Cotswolds. Located within an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, the site includes ancient woodland, unimproved hay meadows, mature hedges, scrub banks, limestone grassland, agro-forestry plantations, springs and ponds together with a quarry registered as a Site of Specific Scientific Interest. Very few sites can provide such a unique and inspiring range of environments from which to learn about the local and national countryside.

The site is also exceptionally well placed to attract visitors from a large catchment area. Nestling in prime Cotswold countryside, it is served by Gloucester, Cheltenham, Bristol and Bath and as it is easily accessible from the M4 and M5, it also makes it within a day’s trip from London, Birmingham and Cardiff. It is well linked to established Gloucestershire tourist sites such as Slimbridge Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust, Westonbirt Arboretum, Prinknash Abbey, Rococco Gardens and Woodchester Park and mansion, therefore having excellent potential to become a valuable asset to South West Tourism as a whole as it strengthens the network.