Areas We Serve · Richmond
Where the words matter this much, you should see them before your visitors hear them.
Whose words the visitor actually hears
Richmond explains itself for a living. A Capitol designed by Jefferson runs guided tours through a building that is still in use. A museum at the old Tredegar ironworks sets out the Civil War deliberately from more than one perspective. An estate west of downtown runs guided tours through its mansion and gardens, where a describer or interpreter has to keep pace with whichever room the group has stopped in. A folk festival on the riverfront exists so that performers and makers can speak for themselves. In each case the thing being delivered is an account, not a fact sheet.
That is why an accommodation here is not finished when somebody competent is standing in the room. An interpreter has to choose a sign for a term that may have no settled one. A describer decides what to say about a monument, a manacle, a portrait — what to name, what to leave for the visitor to weigh. A translator working from a nineteenth-century document decides how much of its language to carry across and how much to gloss. Those are choices, and on this material a careless one does not read as a service defect. It reads as your organisation saying something it never agreed to say.
So we settle the language with you before it reaches anybody. Send the names, the terms and the framing your curators, clerks or educators have already agreed on, and a description script comes back to you marked up for approval before it is recorded; a live assignment goes out with that same list in the provider's hand. Where nothing of the sort is written down yet — which is the usual case — say so, and the questions get asked in the week beforehand rather than in front of a group.
Where we work in Richmond
Henrico and Chesterfield are covered on the same terms as the city, and which side of a line an address falls on is close to the least useful thing you can tell us. What moves the answer is who the session is for and what it is about. A school division's family evening, a committee hearing and a house museum's tour want three different matches even when they are fifteen minutes apart, and that is the distinction the list below is really sorted by.
Capitol Square itself, the buildings of state and city government around it, the court blocks a few streets north, and the older squares where the guided walks tend to start.
Neighborhoods we cover
What we provide in Richmond
Read the list below as six ways of saying the same content to a different person. The question we will come back to you with is not which one you want but what the content is, because that is what decides how many of these it takes.
Providers working in American Sign Language, in tactile signing for DeafBlind visitors, and in International Sign, assigned on what the session is about — a committee hearing, a house tour and a festival stage are three different briefs.
Learn more about ASL & Sign Language InterpretingSettings we staff here
Some of these hand a provider a script weeks ahead. Others hand them a microphone and a crowd. Both are covered — but the first kind is where the wording gets agreed, and that agreement takes time a late booking does not leave.
A working seat of government that also runs public tours, so the same morning can hold a committee session where every word is minuted and a school group being walked through the rotunda.
Displays that set out an event from several perspectives at once, where description and interpretation carry the framing as much as the facts — and where the wording gets approved before it is delivered.
Exhibitions that arrive with their catalogue language already settled. We work from it, so a described canvas and the label beside it do not end up naming the same thing two different ways.
Demonstration floors and hands-on exhibits where visitors are handling something while somebody explains it, and where a class of children sets the vocabulary as much as the curator does.
House tours, grounds and nature programmes, where the route is long, the group is walking, and the provider has to keep up with whichever room or path the tour is currently in rather than working from a fixed script.
Riverfront stages and craft demonstrations running to several programmes at once, in languages the performers bring with them rather than the ones the schedule expected.
Race weekends and stadium-scale events, where an announcement has to reach the grandstand and a screen has to be readable from further away than anyone plans for.
Neighbourhood businesses, tasting rooms and small venues arranging access for an event of their own, usually for the first time and usually with nobody on staff whose job it is.
Where Richmond bookings land
Richmond's access requests come from a compact run of civic and cultural addresses, plus a festival and a raceway that between them fill the calendar either side of summer.
Designed by Thomas Jefferson, and still a working seat of government. ASL interpreters cover guided tours and public events so Deaf and hard-of-hearing visitors get the building and the business conducted in it.
The VMFA's collection spans the world and its programme runs year round. Audio description and ASL interpreting cover tours and exhibitions for visitors of every access need.
A single subject told from several perspectives, on the site of the ironworks itself. Audio description lets blind and low-vision visitors engage with material that is overwhelmingly visual.
Interactive exhibits and education programming in the old Broad Street Station. Live captioning and audio description keep a floor built on demonstration accessible to everyone on it.
NASCAR weekends and the events around them. On-site interpreting and captioning cover a venue where almost all the information arrives over a PA, at volume.
The festival's music, dance and craft stages, and the dining and entertainment districts that carry the rest of the year. On-site interpreting and live captioning are booked with the venues rather than bolted on afterwards.
Working in Richmond
Work is taken here in the order that protects the wording. The material comes first — a script, a term list, a running order, whatever your curators or educators have already settled between them. Who is right for it comes second. The date comes last, because a date agreed before the language is agreed is how a booking ends up with its terminology still unresolved on the morning. Geography is the part that almost never complicates any of that: the city, Henrico and Chesterfield are one working area, and an address changes the travel line, not the sequence.
Client Stories
4.8 · Based on 240 Reviews
Carrie Heitman
"I can not recommend ICS highly enough. Hook & Eye Theater had a wonderful experience working with Shelby and the team at ICS from beginning to end. What an incredible organization serving the theatrical community and beyond."
Frank Starling
"Accessibility is an essential part of inclusion, and Inclusive Communication Services delivered it with excellence at Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity. Their ASL interpreting, CART captioning, and service coordination teams supported our conference stages, networking spaces, and last-minute changes with calm professionalism and deep care."
Christina Dixon
"I had the pleasure of seeing the ICS American Sign Language interpreting team at a conference in San Francisco. Their professionalism and expertise puts them in a league of their own. Shelby and her team set the standard for professionalism, coordination, and accessibility."
Laura Mosteller
"Our company has been using ICS for years at our annual conference. Their kind and clear communication leading up to the event and their prompt arrival each day makes the choice a no-brainer."
Patrick McMullen
"Inclusive Communication Services did an amazing job at Cannes Lions Festival. They treated us with kindness and made sure we had full access to interpreters the whole time. It honestly felt like everything was normal."
Emily Johnson — AADMD
"We have loved working with ICS and appreciate their flexible approach to working with our budget. The services have been game changing for what we are able to provide."
What to expect
Two of these are about getting a person into the room. The other two are about agreeing what that person will say, which is the part first-time clients tend to underestimate.
How booking works
A tour script, an agenda, label copy, a running order — whatever exists. If none of it exists yet, a paragraph about what the session covers and who is expected does the same job at this stage.
Which accommodations the content actually calls for, how many providers, and the background we would match them on. Written, itemised, and with travel folded into the figure rather than added on afterwards.
Names, terms and framing come back to you as a list to correct. For recorded description, the whole script does. Nothing gets recorded, and nobody stands up, on wording you have not seen.
Providers arrive with the agreed list rather than working it out live, and it is kept on file so a second tour or a later exhibition does not start the argument again.
Frequently asked questions
Get started
A script, an agenda, label copy, or one paragraph about what the session covers and who is expected in it. A reply comes on the next working day, and if any of it needs its wording settled before the date, you will read that there rather than discover it in the week of.
