News

9th December, 2010

Bath Named as UK Creative Hotspot

A leading report just out shows that Bath is one of the UK’s major hotpsots for creative activity.

Both Bath and its larger neighbour, Bristol, are listed in the creative top ten by the NESTA report, ‘Creative Clusters and Innovation’, which is the most detailed look yet at the geographical distribution of creative activities across Britain.

The report examines creative activity across the regions and also zooms in to so-called ‘micro-geographies’ to determine the hotspots. Bristol and Bath emerge has having between them particular strength in film & video, music & the performing arts, publishing, software and radio & tv.

The report, which includes the first ever online map of British creativity, describes how creative firms tend to cluster close together in each region and says that their presence in a city “impacts directly on the innovative potential of the places where they are located,” suggesting Bath and Bristol are also two of Britain’s most innovative cities.

Separate research by GWE Business West has already highlighted the importance of the creative industries to Bath's economy: they account for an annual turnover of £800m - more than tourism and retail combined. The city is home to Future Publishing, one of Britain’s largest media companies, as well as a high concentration of digital, design and architecture firms.

Bristol meanwhile is known for its thriving film, television and animation industry, being home to a critical mass of production companies including Endemol West, Icon Films, Tigress, Quickfire Media, Testimony Films and RDF Television West, in addition to the internationally renowned BBC Natural History Unit and Aardman Animations.

For the full NESTA report click here.

To download the GWE Business West report, click here