Grants Announced to Support Three Industrial Heritage Sites

Grants Announced to Support Three Industrial Heritage Sites

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Three more industrial heritage sites are to recieve addtional funding to help secure their futures, with the funds coming from the DCMS, the UK Shared Prosperity Fund, and Historic England.

The Litchfield Waterworks Trust will receive more than £47,000 for a comprehensive architectural survey of Sandfields Pumping Station. The building is on Historic England’s Heritage at Risk register. Dr David Dimeloe, Trustee and lead on the funding bid, said: “This is the culmination of a great deal of hard work and determination. We’re very grateful to Historic England for this grant and look forward to working with BHB Architects and their colleagues to develop a solid roadmap for the future preservation of Sandfields Pumping Station.” More details here: Grant helping to secure future of historic pumping station in Lichfield

The Canal & River Trust has received a £113,000 grant from the UK Shared Prosperity Fund, a government programme aimed at improving pride in place and increasing life chances across the UK, for urgent repairs at the Ellesmere Yard on the Llangollen Canal in Shropshire. The still functioning boat yard was opened in 1806, and is one of the best‑preserved canal maintenance yards in the country. More details here: Vital conservation works underway at historic Ellesmere Yard

North Somerset Council has received an additional £62,120 for further restoration of Birnbeck Pier in Weston-super-Mare. This has been awarded by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) Heritage at Risk Capital Fund, delivered by Historic England. The additional funding will pay for the initial conservation of the Grade II Listed entrance gates and turnstiles. It will also enable further work on the Grade II Listed Toll House and its extension, known locally as the ‘shell shop’, at the southern side of the entrance. More details here: Extra £62k makes more Birnbeck Pier landside restoration possible

Sandfields Pumping Station. Image copyright Dr Michael Nevell.

SPAB One Day Conference: ‘Caring for Their Future: Recording, Repairing, & Researching Mills’, 13 June 2026

SPAB One Day Conference: ‘Caring for Their Future: Recording, Repairing, & Researching Mills’, 13 June 2026

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The SPAB Mills Section is running a one day conference on wind and water mills in Britain on 13 June 2026 in Reading, and booking is now open. There will be chaired panel discussions after both the morning and afternoon talks. Refreshments will be available during break times and delegates will have the opportunity to see some of Rex Wailes’ drawings on display at the Mills Archive Trust.

Mildred Cookson and Nathanael Hodge from the Mills Archive Trust, will share their knowledge on caring for documents and images, and project archivist Hei-Yan Tsui will share some finds from the Rex Wailes collection. Dr Toby Huitson and Duncan McCallum will explore the Mills at Risk theme and the intricacies of listing historic buildings. Justin Coombs will demonstrate his innovative Smartmolen Project, and the confence will also hear from water-mill expert Stephen Bartlett about flood warning and prevention for watermills.

To book the conference follow the this link: Caring for their future: Recording, Repairing, & Researching Mills | The SPAB

More Industrial Heritage Sites Receive Government Grant Support

More Industrial Heritage Sites Receive Government Grant Support

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130 cultural venues, museums, and libraries will receive a share of £127.8 million to protect them for present and future generations. This latest Government support forms part of the ‘Arts Everywhere Fund’. This is in addition to the heritage grants announced earlier in the month which were funded by the DCMS/Wolfson Museums & Galleries Improvement Fund.

These new monies form part of three funding streams administered and delivered by Arts Council England on behalf of the Department for Culture, Media, and Sport. These are:

  • The Museum Estate and Development Fund (MEND) which has allocated £25.5 million to support 28 museums to undertake vital infrastructure works, and improve the visitor experience.
  • The Creative Foundations Fund (CFF) which has allocated £96 million to 74 arts and cultural venues to help theatres, performing arts venues, galleries and grassroots music venues address urgent infrastructure needs. 
  • The Libraries Improvement Fund (LIF) which has allocated a share of £6.3 million to 28 library services to help upgrade buildings and technology to better meet the needs of the community.

The industrial heritage museums and sites receiving support are:

  • Baltic Flour Mills Visual Arts Trust, Newcastle-Upon-Tyne – £3,649,800
  • Black Country Living Museum, Dudley – £454,159
  • Greater Manchester Transport Society – £244,000
  • London Transport Museum – £999,999
  • People’s History Museum, Manchester – £2,491,670
  • Port Sunlight Village Trust – £499,999
  • The Brickworks Museum, Southampton – £280,000
  • The Mill Arts Centre, Banbury – £135,000
  • Watermill Theatre, Newbury – £300,000
  • Whitchurch Silk Mill – £210,045

For further details follow this link: Arts Everywhere Funding – GOV.UK

People’s History Museum, Manchester. Image copyright Dr Michael Nevell.

Industrial Heritage Sites to Recieve Grants From the DCMS/Wolfson Museums & Galleries Improvement Fund

Industrial Heritage Sites to Recieve Grants From the DCMS/Wolfson Museums & Galleries Improvement Fund

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24 local museums in England have been granted a share of £4 million through the DCMS/Wolfson Museums and Galleries Improvement Fund. The Fund brings together £2 million in match funding from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) and independent, grant making charity, the Wolfson Foundation. It supports local museums by improving displays, enhancing collection care, and making exhibitions more accessible to visitors.

The five industrial heritage museums that have recieved £1,034,200 from this year’s grant round are:

  • British Motor Museum, West Midlands – £147,700
  • Black Country Living Museum, West Midlands – £272,000
  • SS Great Britain, South West – £46,300
  • National Tramway Museum, East Midlands – £210,600
  • Food Museum, East of England – £357,600

Full details of the all the museums receiving grants here: Local museums receive £4 million to improve accessibility to arts and culture – GOV.UK

The DCMS/Wolfson Museums and Galleries Improvement Fund provides capital funding for museums and galleries across England to improve displays, protect collections and make exhibitions more accessible to visitors. For 2025-27, DCMS and the Wolfson Foundation have each contributed £2 million to the Fund, which has benefitted more than 440 projects in its more than 24-year history.

One of the trolley bused that will be renovated at the Black Country Living Museum. Image courtesy of the Black Country Living Museum.

Museum Development Grants – Next Round Opening

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The next round of Museum Development grants for the English regions will be opening in the next few weeks. These include Open Grants, Small Grants, and bursaries from the five regional museum development networks in England, with grants ranging from £500 to £7000 depending on the region and type of activity. These are usually designed for accredited museums, or those sites working towards accredition.

Museum Development London are running a free online seminar detailing their grants for 2026-27 on the 23 April. To book follow this link: MDL grants programme 2026-27 coffee morning

Museum Development South East have two Open Grant streams. Round one is currently open and closes on 2 June. Round 2 opens on 21 September and closes on 4 November. For details on both follow this link: Open Grants – Museum Development South East

Applications for Museum Development Midlands Open Grants start on 30 April, with a deadline of 29 June. More details here: Open Grants · MDM

The Museum Development South West Open Grants scheme deadline is 15 April, but applications for their Capacity Grants opens on the 29 April. More details here: Capacity Builder – Museum Development South West

Museum Development North’s Continuing Professional Development Bursaries is a rolling programme, so applications can be submitted at any time from April to 3 December 2026. The scheme may close earlier if all funds have been allocated. Further details here: Continuing Professional Development (CPD) Bursaries – Museum Development North

MDM

Collections Trust Takes on Museums Association’s ‘Find an Object’ Service

Collections Trust Takes on Museums Association’s ‘Find an Object’ Service

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The Collections Trust has taken on the Find an Object platform, a service previously managed by the Museums Association (MA). The platform lists deaccessioned items from museum collections that are available for transfer to other museums or organisations within the public domain.

Users can upload items they plan to dispose of, as well as search for objects that might find a place within their collection. They can also make speculative requests for items that they are looking to acquire. More than 200 items from museums across the UK are already listed on the Collections Trust website. Current listings on the MA website will remain live until 18 May, after which the service will be taken offline. 

Museums with active listings on the are encouraged to repost these to the new site as soon as possible.

Further details here: Collections Trust takes on Find an Object service – Museums Association

Steam Returns to Calderdale Industrial Museum

Steam Returns to Calderdale Industrial Museum

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Calderdale Industrial Museum, after a fundraising campaign and months of hard work and training, will be running its steam engines for the first time since the museum closed 26 years ago, on the 18 April.

Since taking over the running of the museum in 2013, the Calderdale Museum Association (CIMA) has worked towards running the steam engines in the Power Gallery again as they had been before the closure of the museum in 2000. These are the 1926 built Newton, Bean & Mitchell horizontal ‘Corliss’ engine, the 1860s beam engine, the Fairbank Brearley vertical engine and the 1926 Bellis & Morcom inverted vertical compound engine. All are on display in the power gallery.

Once the volunteers worked out what was required, fundraising started in earnest, with money coming from members and visitors to contribute to the replacement of the old inefficient steam boiler. In August 2022, the old boiler was dismantled and removed from the basement and the area prepared for the new boiler. By 2025 enough money had been raised to cover the purchase and installation costs, and the boiler was then supplied and fitted out by H.A. McEwens – Boiler Repairs Ltd. A SolidTek STL 1000 was fitted by SolidTek MD Steve in November 2025 and they have offered to supply the necessary chemicals free of charge. The museum is very grateful for this kind gesture and look forward to working with Steve and SolidTek in the coming years. All the electrical work has been carried out by Richard Lennard, our in house electrician.

CIMA’s steam team operating the Newton Bean & Mitchell Corliss engine. Image copyright CIMA.

In the meantime, the team of museum volunteers have been working on refurbishing and recommissioning the four engines in readiness for public viewing. Training and testing have been going on over the winter, with modifications and repairs carried out as needed. A team of six volunteers were given professional training, over two sessions, by steam consultant Ian Roberts. They are now qualified with a City & Guilds ‘Industrial Boiler Duty Manager Course’. This ensures they operate the gas boiler safely. Further training to run the four engines has been given by Steve Buckley.

The museum plans to run steam fortnightly from 18th April until 28th June 2026, with further dates to follow over the summer period. Running the steam engines will add hugely to the quality of the visitor experience and is a very exciting day for the volunteers who have worked so hard to get to this point. It’s an added dimension to the tourist offering in Halifax and adds to the story told at the museum, of Calderdale’s significant contribution to the industrial revolution of the late 18th and 19th centuries. Enthusiasts from around the country will be drawn to the area to see these beautiful engines at work.

Trevor Hardaker, Operations Director for CIMA, said “Now we can confidently promote steam days where we run the engines, for the public once more. This is a crucial part of telling the story of the development of power in industrial Calderdale and will add to the exciting visitor experience at the museum.”

The museum relies on its open day takings to fund all the work done to maintain and develop the collection. You can now be a named sponsor of steam for a day, by donating £100, or make whatever contribution you can by putting money in Baby Enid or going to the museum website to the donation page. The museum is open on Saturday 10am – 4pm with last entry at 3pm. They also open, with the same hours, on Thursdays during the Calderdale School holidays. The licensed café opens when the museum is open.

New Industrial Heritage Exhibitions for Spring 2026

New Industrial Heritage Exhibitions for Spring 2026

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Each year there are a range of new and temporary exhibitions on industrial heritage and archaeology put on by dozens of industrial heritage sites across England. Spring 2026 sees three new industrial heritage exhibitions open to the public covering coal, salt, and textiles.

“Jason and the Coal Mining Adventure”, is on from the spring to the autumn, 27 March to 4 October, at the National Coal Mining Museum, Wakefield. It is a colourful and immersive reimagining of Britain’s mining history and the communities at its heart.

The “Untangled”, exhibition runs from 23 May to 6 June, at Leeds Industrial Museum. The new exhibition, from the International Felt Makers Association Region Ten, celebrates the connections between nature and industry through textiles.

Lastly, “The Salt of the Erthe”, exhibition runs from 26 February to 28 June 2026, at the Lion Salt Works, Northwich, and celebates Cheshire’s salt heritage.

AIA 2026 Norwich Conference Booking Now Open

AIA 2026 Norwich Conference Booking Now Open

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Booking for the Association for Industrial Archaeology’s Annual Conference is now open via the AIA website:  https://industrial-archaeology.org/Conference. This year’s Conference is to be held at the Mercure Hotel, Norwich, East of England, from the 4th to the 9th September.

The AIA Annual Conference was first established in the 1970s and you can book for in-person or online attendence for the weekend programme. This year’s event follows its traditional format, starting on Saturday with a day of talks on the Industrial Heritage of the area followed by the presentation of this year’s awards and the Conference Dinner. On Sunday morning there will be the AIA AGM followed by the Rolt Lecture. Who was Tom Rolt ?

On Sunday afternoon, Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday morning there will be a series of tours and evening talks. The full itinerary, costs, and accommodation details can be found on the website here: Annual Conference – The Association for Industrial Archaeology

Thanks to the Patrick Nott bursary, there will be five free places for the entire event from Friday to Wednesday, including accommodation, and up to £100 for travel expenses. The places are intended for those who feel they would otherwise be unable to attend. Please send details to the Conference Secretary at conference@industrial-archaeology.org at least 30 days in advance.

Front Cover of the IA Gazetteer from the 1981 AIA Norfolk Conference. Image copyright Association for Industrial Archaeology.

Get Involved With Heritage Open Days 2026

Get Involved With Heritage Open Days 2026

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The 2026 Heritage Open Days will take place from 11 to 20 September. Heritage Open Days is England’s largest community-led festival of history and culture, involving thousands of local volunteers and organisations. Every year in September it brings people together to celebrate their heritage, community, and history. Stories are told, traditions explored, and histories brought to life. All the events are free.

269 industrial heritage sites in England took part in Heritage Open Days (HoD) 2025, offering guided walks, talks, and exhibitions as well as hands on experiences. If you would like to take part then the HoD website has full details on how to list a site, event, and/or acitvity.

For further details on how to take part as an event and/or site organiser follow this link: Get involved