Cultures and memories
![Young people reading poetry around a microphone](/sites/default/files/styles/main_image_desktop/public/media/imgs/R2R%20on%20the%20road%20poetry%20copy.jpg.webp?itok=RJ-Eprwz)
Since 1994 we have awarded £460million to more than 24,100 community and cultural heritage projects across the UK.
What do we support?
We fund projects which help to explore, save and celebrate the traditions, customs, skills and knowledge of different communities.
This cultural heritage is sometimes referred to as intangible or living heritage. This is because it is constantly changing and kept alive when practiced or performed.
We also fund projects which document and share people’s memories. This often involves capturing oral histories and ensuring they are accessible now and in the future.
Project ideas
Our funding could help people:
- research and share oral traditions, such as storytelling or local dialects
- train others in traditional skills and crafts, from dry stone walling and blacksmithing to basket weaving and textile making
- research the origins of culture, such as music, theatre or dance, and create performances influenced by past styles
- share the history and fun of celebrations, festivals or rituals with new audiences, from games and cooking to carnivals and fayres
- capture accounts of traditional knowledge or pass it on, such as woodland management or home remedies
- record the stories of ordinary people through oral histories, for example about growing up, migration or work
- retell people’s memories about a place or event, such as a long-stay hospital, the miners' strikes or the punk movement
How to get funding
If you have an idea for a project, we would love to hear from you.
![Embracing Africa festival](/sites/default/files/styles/hlf_xlarge/public/media/projects/embracing_africa_snapshot_2_0.jpg.webp?itok=r6WJseAS)
Projects
Embracing Africa Project
This 12-month project collected objects and historical information that are important to people and the history of their country, ranging from objects on childbirth to marriage.
![Oral history of Nigerian immigrants from the 1940s-1960s Photo of a child](/sites/default/files/styles/hlf_xlarge/public/media/0001.jpg.webp?itok=BfS6Zx7W)
Projects
Capturing 1940s-1960s stories of Nigerian immigrants to Manchester
This project captured the unrecorded and less well-known experiences of the Nigerians who came to Manchester between 1940 and 1960.
![Jane Austen Walks A group of young people in front of a wall](/sites/default/files/styles/hlf_xlarge/public/media/projects/jane_austen_walks.png.webp?itok=NbsYaBjC)
Projects
Jane Austen Walks
A student-led project created a mobile phone app that updates a Jane Austen walking trail in Hampshire to mark 200 years since the author’s death.
![Panjab Connections Handmade gold jewellery with red and green gemstones displayed on an intricately carved stand](/sites/default/files/styles/hlf_xlarge/public/media/projects/panjab_connections_-_credit_kat_gollock.jpg.webp?itok=Aw9-QowA)
Projects
Panjab Connections
National Museums Scotland worked with the Glasgow Gurdwara and Sikh Sanjog to explore Sikh heritage through the history of the boy Maharaja.
![50 Years of MPA Participants logging archive materials](/sites/default/files/styles/hlf_xlarge/public/media/projects/mpa_alumni_session_with_archive_2_-_12.1.16_-_compressed.jpg.webp?itok=lEOQvY93)
Projects
50 Years of MPA
Mid Pennine Arts (MPA) is looking back through their archives to help celebrate its 50th anniversary.
![Lest We Forget Participants discussing one of the exhibition items](/sites/default/files/styles/hlf_xlarge/public/media/projects/oh-14-06357_lestweforgetatglasgowmuseumresourcecentrebyimantajik.jpg.webp?itok=Hh2hHqH6)
Projects
Lest We Forget
Refugees and asylum seekers in Glasgow explored the experiences of Belgian refugees during the First World War.
![Old papers to go in the memory boxes Ardgowan Primary school memory box](/sites/default/files/styles/hlf_xlarge/public/media/ravenscraig_memory_boxes_64_2_-_2.jpg.webp?itok=IFAiUizK)
Projects
Touching Memory
Touching Memory created memory boxes for people with dementia that explore the everyday life of people living in Inverclyde from the 1950s to the 1980s.
![Joy Bangla: The British Bangladeshi Story in Rossendale Joy Bangla](/sites/default/files/styles/hlf_xlarge/public/media/projects/yr-14-03162_joy_bangla_picture.png.webp?itok=23uGJIMV)
Projects
Joy Bangla: The British Bangladeshi Story in Rossendale
Exploring the contributions of Rossendale’s first generation Bangladeshi Pioneers through intergenerational working.
![Mental Health, Past, Present, Future A group of young volunteers of the Mental Health, Past, Present, Future project](/sites/default/files/styles/hlf_xlarge/public/media/projects/past_present_anf_future_yr-14-06138_youthforia3_jpg.jpg.webp?itok=3mfEFtSr)
Projects
Mental health treatment for young people: past, present and future
The Mental Health, Past, Present, Future project is exploring the history of mental health treatment for young people.
![Thurrock Thurrock](/sites/default/files/styles/hlf_xlarge/public/media/thurrock.png.webp?itok=1n5UOkMB)
Projects
Raising awareness in Thurrock of Alfred Russel Wallace
Funding was used by volunteers of Thurrock Local History Society to collate material for displays about the little-known achievements of Alfred Russell Wallace who was resident at The Dell in Grays Thurrock in the 19th century.
Projects
Women in World War I: The Welsh Experience
This 12-month project focused on the hidden histories of women in the First World War. It marked the Centenary of 1915 – the year when women were first actively encouraged to undertake work traditionally performed by men.
![Bridge to the Future Two volunteers in Roman costume](/sites/default/files/styles/hlf_xlarge/public/media/projects/yr-14-04356_roman2_jpg.jpg.webp?itok=4YqmVmJ-)
Projects
Bridge to the Future
Young people from Chesterton changed their attitude to their neighbourhood by uncovering its Roman past.