The Association of Independent Museums: Land and Outdoor Spaces Management
The Association of Independent Museums (AiM), with partners including Arts Council England, Welsh Government and the National Museum Directors’ Council, commissioned M·E·L Research to explore how museums and heritage organisations managed their land and outdoor spaces. The commissioners recognised that, although many museums held substantial green and blue space – from small courtyards and gardens to meadows, woodland, farmland and industrial landscapes – there was little sector-wide evidence on how this land was being used, or how it could support organisations’ social, environmental and financial goals.
The work sat within a wider context of acute pressures on the culture and heritage sector, including prolonged financial strain and changes in visitor behaviour following museum closures during the Covid-19 pandemic. At the same time, growing public awareness of the climate emergency was pushing museums to consider their environmental responsibilities alongside their more traditional roles in collections care and visitor engagement. The project therefore focused on land and outdoor spaces as potential assets for audience development, community wellbeing, climate resilience and income generation.
A literature and policy review carried out at the start of the project highlighted that most published examples of land-related initiatives came from well-resourced institutions and tended to focus on outcomes rather than the processes and challenges involved. This meant smaller and less-resourced organisations struggled to “see themselves” in the available case studies and to know where to start. Many also perceived their sites as uniquely complex, reinforcing a tendency to work in isolation.
The commissioners wanted M·E·L Research to fill this evidence gap by:
Mapping current practice in land and outdoor space management across a diverse range of museums and heritage organisations. Understanding the strategic drivers, enablers and barriers affecting land-related decision making.
Identifying how outdoor space contributed to wider organisational aims, including environmental sustainability, community engagement, education, income generation and audience growth.
Capturing practical examples of “what works” – including the steps taken, partnerships formed and governance arrangements – to inspire others in the sector.
This brief required engagement with a wide cross-section of the museum and heritage community, covering different sizes, governance models, land types and levels of resource, while also generating enough depth to produce practical guidance and a toolkit.
Approach
M·E·L Research designed a mixed-method, staged programme of work, combining secondary research, quantitative insight and qualitative exploration.
Secondary research
Comprehensive literature and policy review: Explored existing UK and international evidence on the role of outdoor space in museums’ social, economic and environmental agendas, including examples of biodiversity initiatives, sustainability programmes and wellbeing activities.
Identified clear gaps around process-focused case studies and practical guidance, which shaped the primary research design and lines of questioning.
Primary research with the sector: Depth interviews with sector professionals (n=17). Semi-structured online or telephone depth interviews with staff and volunteers responsible for land and outdoor spaces across a variety of museum types.
Covered topics such as strategic intent, planning processes, partnerships, funding, operational challenges, outcome measurement and internal governance.
Allowed exploration of the perceived “uniqueness” of sites, barriers to collaboration, and the role of leadership and trustees in driving land strategies.
Online survey of museums and heritage organisations (n=52): Sector-wide online survey open to museums and heritage organisations managing land and outdoor spaces.
Captured organisational profile (e.g. national museums, local authority museums, independent museums, heritage sites and historic properties), size and type of landholding (from courtyards and open gardens to woodland, blue space, farmland and former industrial land), and ownership or lease arrangements.
Explored strategic planning for land, including whether organisations had a formal written strategy, informal plan or no plan, and the timescales covered.
Measured perceived opportunities and challenges relating to outdoor space, including capacity to invest, and whether land was seen more as a risk or an asset.
Included a MaxDiff (Maximum Difference Scaling) exercise to understand the relative priority placed on six potential outcomes of land management: audience growth, audience diversification, income generation/sustainability, environmental sustainability, community engagement and educational value. The MaxDiff design enabled robust prioritisation without overburdening respondents.
Online community / cross-sector discussion space: An online forum was created to promote dialogue between participating organisations, enabling them to share emerging practice, questions and peer support as the project progressed. This space helped surface examples of innovation, as well as common uncertainties and unmet support needs.
Site visits and case study development (6 locations): M·E·L Research conducted in-depth site visits to six contrasting museums and heritage sites, including Ulster Folk Museum, the Natural History Museum, Ushaw Historic House, Chapel and Gardens, the Battle of Prestonpans (1745) Heritage Trust, Greenfield Valley Museum & Heritage Park and Wheal Martyn Clay Works.
Visits involved guided tours of outdoor spaces, observation of how land related to the visitor offer, and interviews with staff, trustees, volunteers and in some cases partner organisations.
Each visit generated a detailed case study covering the site’s context, land assets, strategic vision, governance and partnerships, funding sources, practical interventions (e.g. meadow creation, heritage farming, rewilding, walking routes and digital interpretation) and lessons learned.
Case study material was used both illustratively in the main report and as stand-alone examples of practice for sector dissemination.
Outputs and use
Analysis: M·E·L Research undertook integrated quantitative and qualitative analysis:
Survey data were analysed using descriptive statistics to profile respondents and explore patterns by museum type, landholding and ownership (e.g. differences between independent museums, local authority museums and national institutions). The MaxDiff results produced a clear ranking of priority outcomes and highlighted the absence of a single dominant objective across the sector. Graphs such as the strategy breakdown on page 15 and ownership and land type profiles on pages 50–52 summarised these findings visually. Interview transcripts, online community contributions and site-visit notes were thematically analysed to identify recurring themes around strategic planning, perceived “uniqueness”, resource constraints, partnership working and measurement challenges.
The case study material was synthesised to highlight enablers of success, such as strong leadership, clear long-term “North Star” goals, collaboration with environmental specialists, and community-focused approaches that embedded sites within their local context.
Reporting and practical resources
The findings were brought together into a comprehensive written report, structured as a visually rich slide-style publication. Key components included:
Context setting and evidence review – outlining why land management mattered for the sector’s social, economic and environmental resilience, and highlighting the initial evidence gaps.
Sector-wide findings – covering strategic planning, perceived challenges and opportunities, collaboration patterns, and outcomes achieved to date. Charts such as the perception of land as opportunity vs challenge on page 22 and planned vs reactive approaches on page 15 made the findings accessible for non-technical audiences.
Good practice case studies – detailed narratives showing how different organisations integrated land into their offer, for example using heritage crops and traditional farming at Ulster Folk Museum, linking dispersed indoor and outdoor assets at Prestonpans Battlefield, diversified governance and master-planning at Greenfield Valley, and experimental environmental programming at Wheal Martyn and the Natural History Museum.
Practical toolkit and recommendations – a step-by-step set of recommendations for organisations at different scales, illustrated with parallel examples for small and large museums (see pages 45–48). This included guidance on:
setting long-term goals and shorter-term milestones;understanding existing land assets;engaging external specialists and partners;experimenting and piloting interventions;aligning land strategies with overall organisational strategies;
involving local communities to secure long-term relevance and stewardship.
Sector-level recommendations – specific actions for funders and sector support organisations, including the need for funding streams that recognise the long-term, iterative nature of land interventions, support for evidence and evaluation, and a stronger role in convening and publicising cross-sector learning (outlined on pages 42–43).
The outputs equipped AiM and partners with a robust, sector-wide picture of how museums and heritage organisations were using – and aspiring to use – their outdoor spaces. The combination of statistical evidence, rich qualitative insight and practical, real-world examples provided a platform for future funding bids, advocacy and programme development focused on land and outdoor spaces as core elements of the museum offer rather than peripheral “gardens”.
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