Connecting People and Places project

The Connecting People and Places project is designed to increase recognition of how migrant and communities of diverse ethnic heritage have influenced heritage across England.

This project focuses on six regions across England:

North-West
Midlands
South-West
North-East and Yorkshire
East
London & South-East

It is contributing to Historic England’s work to enrich understanding of the buildings and places that are important to our national history, as well as to the National Lottery’s Heritage Fund which is committed to supporting heritage projects since 1994.

What does Connecting People and Places hope to achieve for the community?

The project gives these communities a voice, provides learning and development for the students working on it, and provides opportunities for communities of diverse ethnic heritage to share stories about sites of importance within the built environment. It seeks to bring together the wider community through podcasts, publications, exhibitions, and community events open to those lottery players and wider communities across England.

Phase 1 – Research and report
Phase 2 – Public engagement and facilitating collaboration between communities and the heritage and built environment sector

Podcast Series

The release of this podcast was part of the second phase of the Connecting People and Places project. Conversations with a range of guest speakers explore giving a platform to local communities within the built environment sector.

Listen to the podcast

Connecting People and Places publication

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What does heritage mean to you?

Share your thoughts

Research Report

Here is the report published as part of Phase 1, which answers the question: ‘How have ethnically diverse communities had a voice in the planning and design of sites that are significant to them?

Download the report

Now that we’re in Phase 2…

Phase 2 has built on the work and learning from Phase 1 through reaching out to a wider audience and encouraging them to consider how communities of diverse ethnic heritage have influenced and can influence the architecture and heritage sector. This is being achieved through sharing the insights we have gained by means of a podcast, exhibition, and digital publication. These will leave a lasting legacy; inspiring and enabling more people to get involved in their built environment.

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Discover more about our Connecting People and Places research project below.

What is heritage consultancy?

This document was prepared by Purcell, an architectural and heritage consultancy practice, for Blueprint for All which sets out a discussion on heritage and the guiding principles of heritage consultancy. This framework is structured around three main sections: how historic buildings are protected, managing change to historic buildings and understanding historic buildings.

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Video

Watch a short video capturing the key learnings from the research

View video

One thing I found really interesting during the research project, was the absolute focus on the community itself. We used the community to guide us and to navigate us to the right information that could never be found in books. It made collecting our findings more meaningful.

Ayshah Begum