The Architectural Heritage Fund

🚨 📢 Our new strategy has arrived! Since 1976, we have supported nearly 2000 historic building reuse projects across the UK, through £90m of loan offers and £33m of grants invested in the community-led regeneration of historic buildings and places. Today, we are really pleased to launch our new 2023-28 Strategy, which sets out our mission, values and priorities, and describes our strategic aims for the next five years, including our 50th anniversary in 2026. Learn more: ➡️ https://bit.ly/45pbHq3 Thank you to all our partners who help to make our work possible - we look forward to working with you all over the next few years. National Lottery Heritage Fund, Historic England, Department for Culture, Media and Sport, Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, Historic Environment Scotland, Cadw, Department for Communities, Pilgrim Trust, Garfield Weston Foundation, and the William Grant Foundation. #Strategy #StrategyLaunch #Heritage #Historic #Regeneration #Community #Building #BuildingReuse #Reuse #Restoration #Project #RegenerationProject #Charity #SocialEnterprise #Funding #SocEnt

This #TrusteesWeek, we’d like to take a moment to celebrate our fantastic board of trustees. We are incredibly grateful for the time, commitment, and expertise that they contribute to helping us support heritage and community-led regeneration across the UK. Thank you! #Trustees #Charity #Charities #Heritage #Community #Regeneration

🔔 ICYMI: The £15m Energy Resilience Fund (ERF) launched today, offering a blended funding package of loan (60%) and grant (40%) to bolster the energy resilience of eligible charities and social enterprises in England. We are very pleased to be one of the partners of this fund, through which we can support charities and social enterprises based in historic buildings to apply for funding to install energy saving measures or energy generation technology. If you are interested in applying for funding, you can find full details of the ERF and eligibility criteria below. 👇 You can also get in touch with us by emailing our Investment Officer, Emily Greenaway, at emily.greenaway@ahfund.org.uk. #Funding #Energy #Resilience #Sustainability #Charities #SocEnt #EnergyResilience

Mark your calendars! #GivingTuesday, a global day for celebrating and inspiring generosity, is just one month away. This 3rd December, consider making a donation to the AHF; your support will help us to continue our work regenerating heritage across the UK. Want to help this important work carry into the future? You can also become a Friend of the AHF. See more information about the ways you can support us: ➡️ https://bit.ly/3MXlTfU #GivingTuesday2024 #SaveTheDate #Funding #Charity #Donate #Community #Communities #Fundraising #CommunitySupport #Support #GivingBack #Heritage #Regeneration GivingTuesday

📣 Funding news! We are delighted to announce that we have awarded a Project Viability Grant to Crash Bang Wallop Youth Theatre, enabling them to explore plans for taking on the ownership and development of a vacant building on Stokesley High Street. The charity, which provides professional and affordable performing arts training to young people, aims to breathe new life back into this beautiful space by establishing a welcoming and inclusive Arts Centre and Community Hub for residents of Stokesley and the surrounding area. Learn more: 👉 https://bit.ly/3CbS7mZ #Heritage #Community #Regeneration #HighStreet #Historic #Building #Stokesley #NorthYorkshire #Arts #ArtsCentre #CommunityHub #Charity #Theatre #YouthTheatre

Happy #Halloween! 🎃 On Elm Hill, one of Norwich’s oldest and most complete medieval streets, sits the site where Father Ignatius founded his Benedictine monastery. Although the preacher was eventually forced to flee the city, folklore has it that he can still be seen wandering the cobbled lanes today… This eerie tale begins in the 19th century, when Joseph Leycester Lyne first arrived in Norwich. Calling himself Father Ignatius (‘fiery one’), he was a keen street preacher and mystic who could reportedly speak to ghosts. 👻 With an aim to reintroduce monasticism into the Church of England, Father Ignatius established a Benedictine monastery at 16 Elm Hill in 1863. According to legend, he would regularly stand at his front door and ask passers-by to pray with him, cursing all those who refused. Some, it is said, came to a rather unfortunate demise not long after being damned… 💀 Number 16 had soon become plagued with scandals, and there were many calls for Father Ignatius and his followers to leave Norwich. Rent arrears were his final downfall, causing him to be evicted from his home and hounded out of the city in 1866. He fled to London, then died in Wales in 1908. Thanks to Norwich Preservation Trust, 16 Elm Hill, the famous site where Father Ignatius founded his monastery, can still be seen today. With the support of 2 grants and a loan from the AHF, the Trust have restored the house and brought it back into residential use. But the building’s original 16th-century door, now marked with a blue plaque, stands as a significant and ghostly reminder of its past. And that’s not all… Passers-by beware! Father Ignatius’ spirit is said to have returned to the city where he faced the greatest criticism in his life, roaming Elm Hill with a large black Bible and stopping to curse those who fail to acknowledge his presence with eternal damnation. 🔥 📸 Historic photographs by George Plunkett. Recent photos courtesy of Norwich Preservation Trust Ltd. Find more information about the #AHFsupported restoration of 16 Elm Hill: 👉 https://lnkd.in/eWN_zEwc #Halloween2024 #Spooky #ElmHill #Norwich #Ghosts #Supernatural #FatherIgnatius #Heritage #Historic #History #Folklore #Legend

The Grade II* listed Cardigan Market Hall is a much-loved community building that has been in continuous use as a market since it first opened in 1860. Now, thanks to the efforts of Cardigan Building Preservation Trust, the long-term future of this iconic building has been secured. Following a restoration and modernisation project, the Market Hall reopened to the public this summer, offering a new access block and enhanced facilities for traders that will ensure the sustainability of the building for many generations to come. We are very pleased to have supported this project with development grant funding and a Heritage Impact Fund loan to provide cashflow. Read more: ➡️ https://bit.ly/4hq50K5 📸 Cardigan Building Preservation Trust #Heritage #Regeneration #Historic #HistoricBuilding #GuildhallMarket #MarketHall #Market #Traders #Grant #Loan #SocInv #HeritageImpactFund

The programme has been announced for Locality's annual Convention, which is now less than one month away! Understand what the new government means for you, and get practical advice and tools on a range of areas, from improving your energy efficiency to partnering with your local authority. You can also take time to connect with others and step outside the venue to visit Manchester’s thriving community organisations. Our Director of Programmes and Deputy CEO, Kelcey Wilson-Lee, will be at the event. We will also be taking part in a workshop with Historic England and The National Lottery Heritage Fund about bringing historic buildings to life and using heritage as a focus for working with your communities. 📍 Manchester 📅 12 & 13 Nov Don't miss out! Book your ticket today: 👇 https://lnkd.in/eRitEmEv #Community #CommunitySector #Convention #Locality24 #vcse #Heritage #Communities

It’s a new start for the #AHFsupported Old Yew Tree Cottage in Wrecclesham, Surrey. Thanks to a project by Farnham Building Preservation Trust, the Grade II-listed cottage has been renovated into a lovely and cosy modern family home. Just look at the transformation! More good news - with the building back in residential use, the Trust has been able to repay its AHF loan investment in full. Find out more: 👉 https://bit.ly/3C4Q7g4 📸 Farnham Building Preservation Trust #Heritage #Regeneration #Historic #HistoricBuilding #Cottage #ListedBuilding #Housing #SocInv #Loan #Surrey #Wrecclesham

📣 Our October 2024 newsletter is out now! It includes: - A round-up of the latest #Heritage regeneration news. - A project focus on Delapré Abbey . - A guest article from Old School Thornhill. - Information about our grants programmes currently available in Northern Ireland to help projects at the early stages of their journeys. Read it here: ➡️ https://bit.ly/3Numk30 Want it delivered straight to your inbox next time? Sign up to our News Tracker to be one of the first people to receive future news stories, blog posts and newsletters: 👉 https://bit.ly/3cBpS4f 📸 1. The interior of Old School Thornhill. Credit - Laura Sparrow Photography. 2. Delapré Abbey stables. Credit - Delapré Abbey Preservation Trust. #Newsletter #eNewsletter #Heritage #Regeneration #HeritageNews