Month: January 2018

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‘Patrick Geddes’ cocktail at the Permit Room

The Permit Room will serve a special late-night whisky cocktail for Burns Night.

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News Press Release

The Scotch Whisky Experience adds sign languages to its tours

www.iangeorgesonphotography.co.uk The Scotch Whisky Experience adds sign languages to its tours Pictured Joseph Sheridan – (not sure which part of this title you want to use!) Head of ITV SignPost Scotland and part of the BSL/ASL translation team for Scotch Whisky Experience (as well as presenter on the BSL/ASL device) Leyla Whyles – Head of Visitor Experience at the Scotch Whisky Experience Deborah Preston and hearing dog Tess Five-star visitor attraction The Scotch Whisky Experience has become the first in Edinburgh to offer whisky tours in British and American Sign Language. In a pivotal move to enhance accessibility, the Royal Mile attraction has invested over £50,000 into multi-functional audio guides which feature interpreters conducting tours in both BSL and ASL. As 80% of visitors to The Scotch Whisky Experience come from overseas, subtitled tours in German, Spanish, French, Italian, Dutch and Swedish will also be launching, allowing deaf visitors from these countries to enjoy the tour in their own language. The addition of the new BSL and ASL devices means the attraction now offers whisky tours in a total of 20 languages. Lenka Whyles, Head of Operations at The Scotch Whisky Experience, said: “Investing in American and British Sign Language to enhance our suite of languages shows both our commitment to accessibility and our wish for all our visitors to enjoy a 5-star experience in their own language. “Careful consideration has been given to the background colour of the screen on the new devices, as well as the clothes of the interpreters to make them as user-friendly as possible and we also flew one of the American signers over from the USA. “We are really excited that this project is ready to go live and very much look forward to welcoming our first BSL and ASL customers.” The BSL and ASL tours at the Scotch Whisky Experience is officially launching from Tuesday 23rd January. In 2017, the visitor attraction continued its commitment to accessibility and made upgrades to allow increased flexibility for wheelchair users, enabling them to experience the new audio-visual tour elements in full. A wheelchair was also purchased for visitors to use on a free of charge basis. For more information, log-on to www.scotchwhiskyexperience.co.uk or call 0131 220 0441. ENDS Notes to editors: The full list of languages offered at The Scotch Whisky Experience is as follows: British Sign Language, American Sign Language, Gaelic, French, German, Dutch, Swedish, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Polish, Japanese, Czech, Russian, Mandarin, Hindi, Hungarian, Korean, Brazilian Portuguese, Cantonese. American signers’ biographies: Peter Cook is an internally-known deaf storyteller and poet and a Wine and Spirt Education Trust certified scholar specialising in wine and spirits so he was the perfect fit for this project. The second American signer, Robert G. Lee has been an ASL and English interpreter for 30 years. Currently living in England, Robert also teaches, researches and publishes on various aspects of interpreting. British signers’ biographies: British signers Joseph Sheridan and Alex Duiguid are very experienced interpreters. Scottish-born Josef Sheridan is Head of SignPost Scotland and is responsible for managing ITV’s on-screen sign language services in Scotland. Alex Duiguid is an expert and native user of British Sign Language and is a regular presenter of ITV’s signed programming including Emmerdale and Coronation Street. The Scotch Whisky Experience’s Access Guide can be found here: https://www.scotchwhiskyexperience.co.uk/assets/000/002/147/Access_Guide_2018_-_January_2018_original.pdf For more information contact: Gillian Beaton or Julie Trevisan Hunter: The Scotch Whisky Experience 0131 220 0441 G.Beaton@ScotchWhiskyExperience.co.uk or J.Hunter@ScotchWhiskyExperience.co.uk Alie Simpson Senior Account Executive Pagoda Porter Novelli 4 Eyre Place, Edinburgh EH3 5EP Tel: +44 131 556 0770 www.pagodapr.com Twitter: @PagodaPN

Five-star visitor attraction The Scotch Whisky Experience has become the first in Edinburgh to offer whisky tours in British and American Sign Language.

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The Permit Room’s ‘copy tipples’ are a great choice for Dry January

The Permit Room, hidden beneath the kitchen of Dishoom in St. Andrew Square, has an entirely unique and award-winning list of ‘copy tipples’. For those taking a break from alcohol during ‘Dry January’, The Permit Room’s unique and sincere ‘copy tipples’ all look, feel and taste like serious cocktails, but are totally alcohol-free. These ‘copy […]