Gold Award Winners for Accessibility
We've brought home two more awards for the wetlands!
We're delighted to have won another Gold Award for 'Accessible & Inclusive Tourism', along with Bronze for 'Large Visitor Attraction' at the 2024/2025 South West Tourism Awards.
The Awards Ceremony took place on Thursday 5 December, at Batch Country House in Somerset. This was the fourth year applying for this awards scheme and the fourth year that we reached the finals! We're incredibly proud to have won Gold for Accessible & Inclusive Tourism, for the second year in a row - this year up against Bristol Zoological Society and The Roman Baths.
Feedback from the awards has been outstanding, with the marker saying;
Access is central to every decision that is made across this site, this is evident with the Changing Place Toilet and the Living Wetland Theatre - both designed with access at the core.
Every year we have taken on the judge’s feedback and developed our site and accessibility offer. The latest adjustments have included ‘Quiet Wednesdays’ – adapting the site on Wednesday mornings, outside of school holidays, to provide a more comfortable visit for visitors with autism and sensory needs, providing SEND friendly sensory backpacks, and offering SENS sessions for our events.
Winning Gold once again in the Accessible and Inclusive category is a huge achievement for us as all WWT sites exist to fulfil our founder, Sir Peter Scott’s vision of connecting people with nature, and aim for our wetlands and wildlife to be accessible to everyone.
The award recognises that we provide a truly memorable visitor experience for everyone - particularly those with accessibility requirements and demonstrates excellence across every aspect of our business.
Winning Gold also means we have the chance to go through to 2025’s prestigious VisitEngland Awards for Excellence, for which we won Gold for ‘Large Visitor Attraction of the Year’ in 2024.
We want to extend a huge congratulations to all our fellow finalists and a thank you to our incredible staff and volunteers, whose dedication and hard work make WWT Slimbridge a warm and welcoming place for all.
