Culture Recovery Fund for Heritage

https://historicengland.org.uk/coronavirus/funding/recovery/

The £88m Culture Recovery Fund for Heritage offers grants to help heritage organisations or businesses cover operating costs, assess and adapt their business models, and become financially viable. This may include:

• Reopening costs – help to re-open and follow social distancing guidelines
• Operating costs – such as rent, insurance and security
• Hibernation costs – to support temporary changes to the way organisations, businesses and sites work
• Mothballing costs – this could mean closing a site to staff and the public, placing items into storage, or withdrawing from a touring exhibition
• Recovery costs – help to recover from the economic impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and become financially sustainable in the future

An additional £4 million is being used to top up other support schemes for the sector.

Historic England are administering the grants in partnership with the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

Who can apply?

• Not for profit organisations that manage heritage sites, venues or attractions
• Local authorities, universities and other public sector bodies that manage heritage sites, venues or attractions
• Private owners of heritage sites, venues or attractions which are normally open to the public 28 days a year or more
• Heritage businesses that are part of the heritage ecosystem and generate the majority or a substantial portion of their turnover from heritage work – this includes conservators, contractors, specialists and suppliers
• Organisations that manage culturally significant assets or collections

Apply for funding

Grants of £10,000 to £1 million and £1 million to £3 million will be offered to help applicants that were financially sustainable before Covid-19 and after exhausting all other options for increasing their resilience are now at risk of failure. The grants must be spent by 31 March 2021.

Read full guidance on HeritageFund.org.uk

Application dates

• The fund will open for applications on 30 July 2020.
• The deadline for applications is midday on 17 August 2020.

There will be one application round and successful applicants will be notified on awards of up to £1 million by the end of September. Decisions on awards over £1 million will be shared in October.

Historic England will also work with the government as part of its £120m capital funding to restart heritage construction projects and help maintain heritage visitor attractions in England. Further details will be announced shortly.