How does it work?
The Conversation Conservation Project is an initiative created by Gareth Williams, poet, writer and the creator of the ‘Memory Capture Poetry workshops.
These workshops have provided this projects origin or reason to be, given the overlap between them.
It aims to offer a ‘safe place and warm space’ to people living with or affected by dementia or other mental health/well-being conditions to have a conversation with either someone close to them about a subject they've never discussed intimately before, or alternately we can pair them with a ‘friendly stranger’ in a similar lived experience.
This conversation project that is as important as any other, with a promise to listeners that these conversations will widen your ears, broaden your mind and touch your heart.
Each conversation lasts up to an hour and is then edited to extract the key moment of connection between the participants. The full uncut versions of these conversations are then archived forever on the on the special website www.conversationsonservationproject.co.uk where these legacy conversations are stored for future generations to listen to.
The short, circa 5 minutes ‘memory bites’ are also available to listen to on the special ‘Conversation Project’ podcast available on all streaming platforms.
The podcast is hosted by Gareth but includes guests from the dementia community who are taking part in the initiative and guests could be from care companies, voluntary groups, health professionals and family members living along with the condition.
Listeners are given a unique opportunity to “eavesdrop” on these moments of closeness that capture the essence both of a special relationship, and of something that really matters to them both. They offer honesty and wisdom, thoughtful challenges, and personal spirit that aims to widen your ears, broaden your mind and touch your heart. Stories about lives, told your way, often memories about the past, recorded in the present and stored forever in the future.
