Cotswolds residency opens for underrepresented writers

Writing collective Dialect and the Cotswolds National Landscape have announced Stone & Sky, a new Writer-in-Residence programme, aimed at supporting an emerging writer from an underrepresented background.

The residency, running from October 2026 to June 2027, will invite one writer to work attentively with the Cotswold landscape, creating new work that strengthens public connection to the area.

Stone & Sky is part of a larger programme of writer development led by Dialect, a Gloucestershire-based community interest company (CIC) supporting writers from rural and ‘edgeland’ spaces.

A selected writer will use fieldwork, creative research, and community engagement to translate ecological, geological, historical, and place-based knowledge into new creative forms.

The residency also aims to bolster development pathways for writers who are underrepresented in nature writing, fostering a more inclusive creative ecology.

The writer will engage with the landscape on a very part-time basis over nine months and will produce creative work for both digital and in-person activities.

A fee of £2,250 is available for the residency.

Applications are open to writers who consider themselves underrepresented in nature writing – whether through ethnicity, disability, class, sex, gender, sexuality, or any other circumstances.

Applicants must live within one of the local authorities within the Cotswolds National Landscape boundary.

The deadline for submissions is midnight on Sunday, September 6.