Outreach to Ownership Research Pilot

Between September 2021 and September 2023 Historic England delivered the Outreach to Ownership research pilot in partnership with Historic Environment Scotland. A two-year, two phase pilot programme funded by a grant from the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC).

The Outreach to Ownership pilot tested a ‘hub and spokes’ model with Historic England and Historic Environment Scotland running a central ‘Outreach to Ownership hub’ that designed and delivered capacity building and grant support to ‘Outreach to Ownership spokes’ partner organisations from across England and Scotland.

Spoke partners where recruited through an open call with five partners offered grants of up to £30,000.00 to support their projects in phase one. Across this phase Historic England, Historic Environment Scotland and academic partners delivered a capacity building programme to refine and develop partners project ideas, research mythologies and project outputs.

In phase two, four of our partners went on to develop their ideas further with additional grant support and a light touch programme of networking workshops facilitated by Historic England and Historic Environment Scotland.

Phase one only partners

• The Churches Conservation Trust, the Heritage Trust Network, Historic Churches Scotland and Churches Trust for Cumbria - whose consortium project ‘Bridging the Gap’ explored the barriers and solutions to sustainable community ownership of historic rural churches.

Phase one and two partners:

• Heritage Lincolnshire, whose project ‘Building on History’ delivered with the School of Architecture Design and the Built Environment at Nottingham Trent University explored the potential of a co-created digital tool to recognise diverse heritage
• The Scottish Council on Archives, whose project 'Everyone's Stories Matter' explored the obstacles and opportunities around managing community archives in Scotland culminating the creation of a community archives toolkit
• MSDS Marine and Moder Dy, whose project ‘Cladaichean to laebraks: Maritime heritage and engagement on Skye and Shetland’ explored inclusive heritage engagement in island communities
• The Art House, whose project ‘Makey Wakey’ sought to understand the impact of creatively using vacant shop spaces in the Ridings Centre in Wakefield.

Evaluation

The pilot was evaluated throughout by Bright Culture who also contributed to partner capacity building delivering responsive mentorship programme.

Learn more about the pilot.

Find out more about the pilot's design and delivery, our partners, their projects and their experiences by  downloading the Outreach to Ownership podcast.