img. courtesy Coventry University.
An online archive of photos, videos, maps and documents designed to celebrate the city’s heritage: this is the new initiative promoted by Coventry University in cooperation with Coventry City of Culture Trust, Culture Coventry and other partners.
Coventry Digital was set up to allow people with connections to Coventry to revisit and celebrate its past and update it with new assets, images and content. It also has the potential to allow augmented and virtual reality uses as its content and contributions develop. So far, more than 12,000 items including photos, videos, maps and documents have been uploaded to the archive – featuring a wide range of Coventry’s most unique and defining features from years gone by as well as more recent times.
The online archive represents a very performed tool to document Coventry history and it is good that its launch proceded the UK City of Culture celebrations which will start in May and will run for 12 months.
We have every confidence that Coventry Digital will be a great asset to the city and its surrounding communities and it will undoubtedly get better as we add more to it.
We’re asking families, businesses and community groups to contribute their archives by getting down their shoe boxes, opening up those old filing cabinets, and getting in touch. We want people in 20, 40, 60 years to be able to see their grandparents in colour and voice through Coventry Digital, knowing their memories are safe and accessible. We want people to look back and have a better understanding of where they come from.
Coventry Atlas, which can be accessed through Coventry Digital, has also been developed to allow users to zoom into specific locations and see their unique, individual archives. As a funding partner of the project, Coventry Atlas has facilitated the digitisation of a vast range of images, assets and resources that have been made available through Coventry Digital, including an interactive map displaying wartime bomb damage to the city.
- More information on the Coventry University website
- Visit the Coventry Digital.
