For millions of blind and visually impaired people, image descriptions — known as “alt text” — are how they experience the world online. However this traditional alt text is often generic, transactional or just non-existent -- stripping the magic and emotion out of travel planning.
To paint a more vivid picture of Tennessee' beauty for visually impaired travelers, we pulled in the most world-reknowned storytellers to write sensory-rich, lyrical photo descriptions -- Tennessee songwriters.
in earned media
of long-form video
of long-form video
image descriptions written
This industry-first initiative to enhance the online experience for more accessible travel. Lyrical alt-text descriptions on tnvacation.com allow screen-reader users to feel Tennessee’s unmatched beauty, culture and spirit through immersive storytelling rather than generic labels. All developed in direct consultation with the blind and visually impaired community in Nashville.
Who better to describe Tennessee than its most valuable resource. We collaborated with 12 iconic songwriters to craft and reimagine how alt text can function as part of the creative storytelling process. They intentionally avoided purely visual indicators. Instead, they focused heavily on the remaining four senses—sound, touch, smell, and taste—to build a truer emotional resonance.
Dolly Parton
Kix Brooks
Nicole Akins
David Tolliver
Billy Montana
Brian Davis
JP Williams
Hilary Williams
Thomas Edwards
The campaign launched with 500 lyrical alt-text image descriptions. Because of its success, the program scaled rapidly, expanding to cover more than 1,000 images across the state's tourism site.
The project’s emotional depth immediately caught the attention of the broader industry. Artists began advocating to participate. Dozens of songwriters requesting to volunteer their talents to write lyric-driven descriptions for future site imagery. Major figures and principals from the Nashville Songwriters Association International (NSAI) stepped forward to offer their support.
We even provided guidelines for brands, website developers, and other regional tourism boards to easily build their own creative alt-text models to support blind communities globally. By offering this framework freely to the world, the project successfully pressured the tech and travel industries to view alt-text not just as a dry compliance checkbox, but as an active, creative extension of brand identity.
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