Lessons from The Summerfield Community Chest: Age Friendly Cotswolds
Between 2023 and 2026, Gloucestershire VCSE Alliance and The Summerfield Charitable Trust partnered on an innovative investment strategy designed to bring grant-making decisions closer to the communities they serve. This blog is part of a series exploring what has been learned along the way and highlighting some of the exciting projects being supported through this approach.
One of these projects is Age Friendly Cotswolds - a pilot project that seeks to transform the experience of ageing in rural communities by increasing opportunities for contribution, connection, and influence. Led by a partnership of local VCSE organisations, it is bringing together older residents, community and statutory organisations to explore how a rural district can become genuinely age-friendly, where older people are visible, valued, and central to shaping the communities they call home.
Why Cotswold district?
Our research began with a series of conversations with groups of older people across the county. This included members of the Friendship Cafe run by Tetbury Area Youth and Community Trust (TAYCT), who expressed a deep concern for their home town, had clear views about what was important to them and what would help Tetbury flourish, but were lacking a way of creating the changes they wanted to see. This was reinforced by further conversations in Cirencester and North Cotswolds, where people talked about the challenges of rural living, limited transport and digital exclusion and the importance of friendship, staying active and opportunities to come together.
Their views were backed by data which evidences these challenges and shows that Cotswold District has the highest proportion of older people in Gloucestershire, with rapid projected growth over the next decade.
The Age-Friendly Communities Framework
Age Friendly Cotswolds is rooted in the World Health Organisation’s Age-Friendly Communities Framework and focuses on four themes that reflect local priorities:
Health and Wellbeing – promoting activity and preventative support
Social and Civic Participation – expanding opportunities for connection and volunteering
Empowerment and Resilience – improving access to information, digital inclusion and one-to-one navigation
Impact and Influence – ensuring older people’s voices shape local decisions and practice
The Framework offers a practical, evidence-based approach, while allowing flexibility to respond to local need and for the project to evolve over time.
Project delivery
Delivery is led by a partnership of four VCSE organisations:
Each of the three placed-based charities hosts an Age-Friendly Champion, a dedicated member of staff focused on listening to older people, strengthening connections, and developing practical, locally driven initiatives that make a real difference.
“The role is about reaching out into the community and hearing from all sorts of people, including individuals, organisations and businesses, and bringing them together in a way that genuinely supports and benefits older people.’”
Karen Saffarian, Age-Friendly Champion in North Cotswold
Champions support Ambassadors, who are usually older people themselves. Their role is to amplify the voices of their peers, create new connections, and spark community-led initiatives. So far, each area has welcomed a small group of Ambassadors, and their insights are already shaping local priorities and activities.
Listening and influence
A clear message emerging from conversations with older people is a strong desire for more opportunities to stay physically active. In response:
The Churn has expanded its programme of classes, with strong demand and fully booked sessions.
Tai Chi sessions for older people are thriving in Stow and will soon begin in Cirencester.
One Ambassador has volunteered to launch a running club.
In Cirencester, Ambassadors have also highlighted a desire for more regular social opportunities. This has inspired a range of community-led initiatives:
One Ambassador has set up a book club.
A community café has opened in South Cerney.
Two pubs (in Cirencester and South Cerney) are planning affordable three-course lunches designed to become welcoming, regular community gatherings.
Each of these initiatives is initially being supported initially by The Churn, with the intention of handing ownership over to the local community, helping to ensure their long-term sustainability.
‘Age Friendly Cotswolds has introduced us to a far wider spectrum of older people and has opened up different conversations. It has shifted us, as an organisation, from ‘doing for’ to ‘doing with’ older people.’
Sarah Bourne, CEO of The Churn
In Tetbury, older residents are raising concerns about access to transport. This is an ongoing challenge that is becoming more pressing with plans to relocate the GP surgery to the edge of town. Age Friendly Cotswolds provides a platform for people to come together, engage with transport providers, advocate for those whose needs are not being met and collaboratively explore solutions.
Meanwhile, in the North Cotswolds, feedback has highlighted a preference for receiving information in printed, “hard copy” formats rather than digital. In response, a local newsagent, who is also an Age-Friendly Ambassador, has become a central hub for information in Stow-on-the-Wold and has established a regular newsletter that is distributed to both the town and surrounding villages. Through this, the project will be able to connect directly with households in a format that works for older people.
Project support
Age UK Gloucestershire is taking a coordinating role, supporting the partnership, driving the evaluation, building wider connections, and promoting the project across the county.
An Age Friendly survey is currently live and seeking to capture the views of older people. Organisations supporting older people in Cotswold District are asked to encourage and support them to complete this. It will both help shape how the project evolves and act as a benchmark against which progress can be measured.
The survey can be completed online. Hard copies are available from any of the four partner organisations.
Next steps
The grant from The Summerfield Trust includes a substantial fund to be used as a Community Chest. Project partners are in the early stages of working out how this might operate and how older people can be empowered to make spending decisions in their locality.
Conclusion
Age Friendly Cotswolds demonstrates how putting local people at the heart of decision-making can unlock energy, ideas and solutions that might otherwise remain hidden. By listening to older residents and supporting them to become active partners in shaping their communities, the project is helping to create places where people can age well, stay connected and continue to contribute.
As the project develops, the Community Chest offers an exciting opportunity to deepen this approach further, giving older people a direct role in deciding how resources are invested in their communities. In doing so, Age Friendly Cotswolds is not only responding to the challenges of an ageing population but helping to build stronger, more inclusive communities where older people are visible, valued and influential.
The lessons emerging from this work will have relevance far beyond the Cotswolds and illustrate the potential of community-led investment to create lasting change.
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