Richard Goldthorpe

Bristol

Previously a landscape architect and a placeshaping manager, Richard Goldthorpe, now Head of Placemaking and Design at the National Trust was a must on our list to visit.

We meet Richard at Wapping Wharf in Bristol, an area that has been transformed into a thriving community. In the distance dashes of colour cover houses as they poke out from behind trees, a plethora of boats cling to the water’s edge and people stroll by enjoying the space, the amenities and the early October sun.

Richard gives us a little overview of the Trust, “We have masses of sites, we’ve got 250,000 hectares of land, we’re about the fourth largest landowner in the country. So when it comes to thinking about urban and rural landscape-led policy, spatial strategies, masterplans or site designs, our team’s certainly got it’s work cut out.”

Placemaking is a term that is extensively used and we were keen to find out Richards’s thoughts, “I think increasingly people are starting to peel it back and talk about place-led approaches and take the ‘making’ out of placemaking.” The place-led approach for the trust is based on nature, history and beauty, but in service of people. Richard continues, “How a place feels is uniquely different to absolutely everybody because everyone’s own sensory perceptions, associations and memories of place all play a big part in how it feels to them.”

The National Trust is well known for its wide green spaces and stately homes but more projects like Castlefield Viaduct in Manchester, a UK equivalent to the New York Highline, is seeing the Trust make a big impact in highly populated urban areas. Richard says, “We are always looking where we can have the biggest public benefit to the widest number of people.” Projects like this transform forgotten spaces into beautiful publicly used areas. They show how clever thinking, good investment and future planning can quickly and effectively change the place feel and bring some much-needed green space into our densely populated urban areas.

Richard has always been involved in urban projects. “I started off at English Heritage and then worked at Bristol City Council, and so I’ve always been interested in historic designed landscapes, city design and the public realm. But it’s the connection people have with their places – urban or natural – that really interests me.” His team at the Trust is always looking for the physical connection of places. For example, a National Trust woods could situated next to a canal system, that canal could lead to a stately home. So recognising these connections and thinking of how they could be linked means the spaces aren’t just individual islands. There is also the equally important human connection and attachment to place, he says “We want to be working on projects where people feel proud of a place, somewhere they would want to visit again and again, ultimately creating spaces that connect on a physical and emotional level.”