Published: Wednesday, 17th June 2026
Heritage projects across Medway have been awarded more than £118,000 in grant funding as part of the Medway Heritage Place programme.
The Medway Heritage Place programme is a ten-year partnership with The National Lottery Heritage Fund as part of their Heritage Place initiative, where up to 20 places across the UK will benefit from £200million of investment. The initiative responds to local need and opportunity, supporting places to use heritage to build pride in place, inspire local communities and power regeneration.
Since 2023 Medway Council has been working with the heritage sector across Medway to shape a long-term shared ambition for heritage across the area, develop new ideas and approaches, and unearth new stories which deserve to be told.
In the latest round of funding, applicants were invited to apply for grants in two categories - with funding between £250 and £8,000 available through the Development Grant scheme, and grants of £15,000 and £30,000 available through the Collaborative Heritage Project Grant scheme. The funding supports applicants to safeguard Medway’s heritage and share the places and stories that matter to local people and communities with residents and visitors.
A total of 93 applications were received and 11 projects across Medway have been given the good news of a grant funding and support to deliver their idea.
They are:
Development Grant projects
- Barnsole - Through Our Eyes: £750
A school-wide community heritage project inviting Barnsole Primary School pupils to submit photographs, artwork and poems that reflect what their community means to them for an exhibition celebrating local stories and heritage. - Flight Path Futures - Young People Exploring Medway's Wetland Heritage: £6,280
Led by Bird Wise North Kent and supported by RSPB Medway Volunteers, the project will introduce children and families to birdwatching through beginner-friendly sessions, family activities and online resources and new signage at The Strand. - Patterned Pasts: Reinterpreting the Brook Theatre Through Heritage Surface Design: £5,000
This project celebrates the rich Victorian and Edwardian craftsmanship of the Brook Theatre through illustration, research, and hands-on community workshops exploring traditional heritage crafts. The project will result in new fabric and wallpaper designs for the theatre’s restoration, with a final exhibition during Heritage Open Days 2026. - Virtual Gallery of Dockyard Artefacts: £7,040
Chatham Dockyard Historical Society will create a virtual 3D gallery of artefacts from Chatham Dockyard viewable in the museum and online. These artefacts, which are part of the yard's rich heritage, are held in the Historical Society's collection but rarely displayed. The Society will explore how to make the collection accessible and available for education and research as well as to the public. - Unforgotten: £6,942
The Medway Arts and Homelessness Forum will work with Arts & Homelessness International to support people with experience of homelessness to gather contemporary stories and explore how homelessness and hardship have appeared in different forms throughout Medway’s history and how communities have responded. - The Sikh Heritage Memory Map of Medway: £8,000
This project will map and preserve the oral histories and cultural contributions of the Sikh community across Medway through digital storytelling and an interactive online map. - Twenty – Medway’s Black Heritage: £6,496
A community-led archival initiative dedicated to documenting and preserving the lived experiences of 20 individuals from Black communities across Medway, through oral histories, portrait photography, and accessible digital storytelling. - New Folk for the Medway Residency: £8,000
Combining archival research and local histories, field recording, and place-based storytelling on the Hoo Peninsula, this project explores the connections between the River Medway and local communities through folk music. The project will develop new audio works and a digital collection that capture the character, memory and changing identity of the area.
Collaborative Heritage Grants
- Preserving Medway’s rich Medieval food heritage through the cocreation of children's television: £19,969
KMTV's popular children's series News Nuggets will be going on a historic adventure for a two-part Medieval Medway special. From farming to feasts, inquisitive young people from Swingate Primary School will team up with the News Nuggets team, Medway Queen, Cuxton Allotment Volunteers and University of Kent Academic Dr Christopher Monk to discover how food shaped the lives of local communities hundreds of years ago. - Deaf Memories Of Medway (DMOM) - 100 Years of Medway Deaf Club: £29,841
SEE and CREATE are partnering with Medway Deaf Club and the Royal Association For The Deaf on a joint heritage project to capture the stories and experiences of Medway’s Deaf community, and celebrate the centenary of the Medway Deaf Club with a new exhibition. - Rolling Drawbridge: £22,000
The Drawbridge Project at Fort Luton will explore and celebrate the fort’s remarkable rolling drawbridge - believed to be the only surviving example of its kind in the UK. This rare piece of Victorian military engineering will be brought to life through research, interpretation, and a programme of public open days in partnership with young people from 38th and 40th Strood Explorer sea scout unit.
Cllr Nina Gurung, Medway Council's Portfolio Holder for Heritage, Culture and Leisure
Cllr Nina Gurung, Medway Council’s Portfolio Holder for Heritage, Culture and Leisure, said: “It’s wonderful to see that another wide-ranging collection of amazing Medway heritage projects are going to benefit from this fantastic partnership with The National Lottery Heritage Fund. This adds to the 23 projects to have already benefited from development funding through the Heritage Place scheme to date. Project funding is making a huge difference - both to individual projects, collaborative ventures and to Medway’s heritage as a whole. The combined effect is breathing new life and energy into Medway’s cultural offer, and raising the profile of our heritage locally and beyond Medway. It is particularly great to see this year’s projects engage children and young people in exciting ways with our local heritage and how the the diverse projects cover the whole of Medway. I’d like to thank all involved, from The National Lottery Heritage Fund our Heritage Team officers, to the applicants, volunteers, the Medway residents and visitors that support and enjoy our heritage initiatives. This is particularly exciting, coming hot on the heels of another wonderful news that The National Lottery Heritage Fund have also awarded Tempo Time Credits £232,874 to deliver a three-year programme ‘Pathways to the Past’ in Medway.”
Stuart McLeod, Director of England – London & South at The National Lottery Heritage Fund, said: “As one of our Heritage Places, we see enormous potential for heritage to inspire and connect communities across Medway. From uncovering untold stories to bringing people together, these projects demonstrate the powerful role local communities play in shaping and celebrating the heritage of the place they call home. Heritage Places is a long-term, strategic investment designed to boost pride in place and strengthen connections to heritage. These community grants are a fantastic way to bring that vision to life, supporting grassroots ideas that will have a lasting impact across Medway. This investment will help ensure Medway’s rich and diverse heritage is not only protected, but reimagined in ways that engage new audiences and create lasting pride in place.”
It’s not the only good news for heritage and culture in Medway, as the funding follows the announcement that Tempo Time Credits have been awarded £232,874 by the Heritage Fund to deliver a three-year programme ‘Pathways to the Past’ in Medway.
Their programme will use heritage to connect communities, grow volunteering, and support the ambitions of the Medway Heritage Place programme by designing new ways for residents to get involved in Medway’s heritage as volunteers.
At the heart of the project is a new locally based staff member, who will work closely with Medway Council, community groups and heritage organisations. Residents will be offered various ways of getting involved, from flexible, one-off micro-volunteering roles, to ongoing volunteering pathways that fit comfortably around people’s day-to-day lives.
Anyone interested in volunteering, partnering or learning more about the opportunities ahead can contact Tempo at support@wearetempo.org for updates, upcoming events and ways to take part.
The Medway Heritage Place programme is made possible with The National Lottery Heritage Fund. Thanks to National Lottery players, we are able to bring Medway’s stories to life in new ways for new audiences.
More information about Medway Heritage Place is available here.
More information about The National Lottery Heritage Fund Heritage Places funding is available here.
Further information on heritage projects:
Project: The Sikh Heritage Memory Map of Medway
Grantee: Adipat Virdi
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/adipatvirdi
Twitter / X: @adipatvirdi
Project: Twenty – Medway’s Black Heritage
Grantee: Michi Masumi
Website: Michimasumi.co.uk
Instagram: Instagram.com/michimasumi_creativetech/
Project: Barnsole -Through Our Eyes
Grantee: Friends of Barnsole
Facebook: Facebook.com/barnsoleschool
Project: Flight Path Futures - Young People Exploring Medway's Wetland Heritage
Grantee: Birdwise North Kent
Website: NorthKent.Birdwise.org.uk
Socials: Bird Wise North Kent are on Facebook, Instagram and X as @birdwisenk
Project: Patterned Pasts: Reinterpreting the Brook Theatre Through Heritage Surface Design
Grantee: Matilda Flood
Website: MatildaFlood.com
Instagram: matilda_illustrates
Project: Virtual Gallery of Dockyard Artefacts
Grantee: The Chatham Dockyard Historical Society
Website: Cdhs.org.uk
Project: Unforgotten
Grantee: Medway Arts & Homelessness Forum
Website: Creatabot.co.uk/Portfolio/Medway-arts-and-homelessness-forum/
Project: New Folk for the Medway Residency
Grantee: Kat Pegler and Jack Coleman
Collaborative Heritage Grants
Project: Preserving Medway’s rich Medieval food heritage through the cocreation of children's television
Grantees: KMTV, Medway Queen, Cuxton Allotment Volunteers, Swingate Primary School and University of Kent academic Dr Christopher Monk
Website: Kent.ac.uk/kmtv/News-Nuggets
TikTok: Tiktok.com/@kmtvcreative?_r=1&_t=ZN-957E6p5x4ks
Instagram: Instagram.com/kmtvcreative?igsh=MWtjc3QxeXNoaXc5NQ==
LinkedIn: Linkedin.com/company/kmtvkent/posts/?feedView=all
Project: Deaf Memories Of Medway (DMOM) - 100 Years of Medway Deaf Club
Grantees: See & Create CIC, Medway Deaf Club and the Royal Association of Deaf People
Website: SeeAndCreate.org.uk
Instagram: Instagram.com/see_and_create/
Facebook: Facebook.com/seeandcreate
#: #SeeAndCreateProjects
Website: RoyalDeaf.org.uk/
Project: Rolling Drawbridge
Grantees: Fort Luton CIC and 38th and 40th Strood Explorer sea scout unit
Website: FortLuton.co.uk
Facebook: Facebook.com/people/Fort-Luton/100064434290117/
About The National Lottery Heritage Fund
Our vision is for heritage to be valued, cared for and sustained for everyone, now and in the future. That’s why as the largest funder for the UK’s heritage we are dedicated to supporting projects that connect people and communities to heritage, as set out in our strategic plan, Heritage 2033. Heritage can be anything from the past that people value and want to pass on to future generations. We believe in the power of heritage to ignite the imagination, offer joy and inspiration, and to build pride in place and connection to the past.
Over the next 10 years, we aim to invest £3.6billion raised for good causes by National Lottery players to make a decisive difference for people, places
and communities.
Follow @HeritageFundUK on Twitter/X, Facebook and Instagram and use #NationalLottery #HeritageFund
About Heritage Places
Heritage Places is a long-term, strategic investment from The National Lottery Heritage Fund in up to 20 different places across the UK. Heritage Places aims to play a vital role in supporting communities in the long term to revitalise the heritage they care about and to explore the wide-ranging benefits it can bring by contributing to local identity, increasing heritage skills and boosting pride in places. To date, 15 Heritage Places have been announced who will share £200million investment. They include:
- Armagh City, Banbridge and Craigavon Council Area
- Barking and Dagenham, London
- Belfast Historic Waterfront, Northern Ireland
- Castell-nedd Port Talbot (Neath Port Talbot)
- County Durham (focused around Shildon and Newton Aycliffe)
- Dudley, West Midlands
- Glasgow (focused on Sauchiehall Street, in the city centre)
- Leicester
- Medway
- North-East Lincolnshire
- Orkney Islands, Scotland
- Stoke-on-Trent
- Tameside, Greater Manchester
- Torbay
- Ynys Môn (Isle of Anglesey), North Wales
About Tempo Time Credits
Tempo Time Credits is a charity that has been working with communities across the UK for 16 years, using Time Credits as a practical tool to recognise people’s contributions and open access to new opportunities. People earn Time Credits for volunteering and community participation and can spend them on a wide range of activities, including theatre, museums, sport, leisure and family days out. Tempo works with local authorities, health partners, housing providers, heritage and arts organisations, and community groups to build more connected, resilient communities.