Havering London secures £1.6m to drive cultural transformation

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Havering London, a new cultural and placemaking organisation, has secured £1.6m of investment to bring to life Havering’s new Cultural Strategy, ‘A Good Life’. This funding supports a three-year programme from April 2025, shaping Havering as a vibrant cultural place.

This programme will be catalysed by £500,000 of National Lottery Place Partnership funding from Arts Council England, enabling new partnerships and innovative ways of working to meet the borough’s cultural needs, and £250,000 from The National Lottery Heritage Fund, celebrating and promoting Havering’s diverse heritage. A fundraising initiative to secure public and private sector support for ‘A Good Life’ was launched in March 2024, following the campaign to become London Borough of Culture. This initiative builds on the momentum of 50 organisations and 1,000 members of the public who collaborated to develop the bid.

‘A Good Life’ is a bold strategy to grow Havering’s cultural landscape, empowering communities to shape a vibrant and equitable cultural life. By placing local people at the heart of decision-making, it fosters wellbeing and belonging. Through participatory initiatives, networks, and co-designed programmes, residents will gain the skills and opportunities to influence the borough’s creative future.

At the heart of ‘A Good Life’ are 30 projects structured around four key themes:

• Havering: Unearthed – Celebrating and promoting the borough’s diverse history through a new heritage trail, a landmark public event in Romford market, an immersive club culture archive, and a Heritage Projects Officer to help build crucial capacity (supported by Historic England).
• Havering: Common Ground – Establishing a new network of community venues with refreshed facilities to enable shared programming, new community celebrations, public art and craft exhibitions.
• Havering: Empowered – Nurturing creative talent by establishing a new artist studio, skills development programme, and an innovative digital website.
• Havering: Thriving – Embedding culture in wellbeing through artist-led health initiatives, a green-focused public talks programme, environmental activism, and creative projects by Deaf, disabled and neurodivergent artists.

Whilst £1.6m has been secured to date, Havering London is now launching the Cultural Investment Fund as part of raising a further £800,000. This initiative invites local businesses and philanthropists to contribute towards match funding for artists and organisations, further strengthening Havering’s cultural ecosystem.

Central to ‘A Good Life’ is the newly formed People’s Panel, comprising 20 dedicated residents who will collaborate with the Partnership Panel of organisations delivering the programme. Key partners include Creative Health Havering, Fuse (Local Cultural Education Partnership), Havering Changing, Havering Museum, London Borough of Havering, New City College, Romford BID, and the Centre for Performance, Technology, and Equity (PTEQ) at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama.

Dr David Shearing and Mathew Russell, Directors of Havering London, said:
“We are immensely proud of the collaborative efforts that have brought this historic investment to Havering. The funding will enable a step change in cultural provision, ensuring the people of Havering can access and contribute to a thriving cultural life.”

Cllr Gillian Ford, Deputy Leader of Havering Council and Cabinet Member for Adults and Wellbeing, said:
“Havering London is delivering on providing greater access to our arts and culture which are pivotal in supporting our ambitions to improve social connectivity and promote greater physical, emotional, mental health and wellbeing for our residents.”

Michelle Walker, London Area Director, Arts Council England, said:
“We’re proud to support A Good Life through National Lottery Place Partnership funding: a collaborative initiative that invests in the borough’s long-term cultural growth, aligning with our commitment to ensure that culture plays a central role in communities. We look forward to celebrating how the new partnerships fostered by A Good Life will help Havering thrive in the years ahead.”

Stuart McLeod, Director of England – London & South at The National Lottery Heritage Fund, said:
“We are delighted to support this project, which thanks to money raised by National Lottery players, will mean that more people will be able to get involved with, protect, and learn about the exciting heritage right on their doorstep. Heritage has a huge role to play in instilling pride in communities and boosting local economies, and this project is a fantastic example of achieving those aims.”

Julie Frost, Director, Romford BID, said:
“Romford BID is excited to be part of this transformative journey. Culture plays a key role in enhancing the vibrancy of our town centre, which will be animated in new ways throughout this project.”

Tom Foxall, Regional Director, Historic England, said:
“Havering’s rich history holds many untold stories, and we are excited to bring these to life by funding a Heritage Projects Officer role. By reanimating heritage sites and making them accessible to growing communities, we can ensure that heritage remains a living, breathing part of the borough’s identity.”

James Jackson, Director of Havering Changing, said:
“Havering Changing is proud to support A Good Life. This bold new strategy will continue to make creativity more accessible through community-led projects and local collaborations to ensure that everyone in Havering has a voice in shaping our cultural future.”

Professor Bryce Lease, Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, said:
“Through the Centre for Performance, Technology, and Equity, we are committed to advancing digital access and equity in cultural participation. By exploring the creative potentials of technology, we can empower diverse communities to engage with and shape Havering’s cultural landscape.”

Further details about ‘A Good Life’ and upcoming opportunities will be shared in the coming months. For the latest updates, visit www.haveringlondon.com

#AGoodLife @HaveringLondon
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Havering London
A new cultural placemaking organisation at the intersection of public, private, and voluntary sector partnerships, Havering London is shaping a progressive vision for culture in the borough. Emerging from a collaborative bid for London Borough of Culture, developed with 50 groups and 1,000 members of the public, the organisation is now delivering A Good Life, a three-year strategy (2025–2028) that seeks to embed culture at the heart of everyday life.
www.haveringlondon.com

Havering Council
One of London’s largest boroughs, Havering is committed to delivering high-quality services that promote community wellbeing and economic resilience. Rooted in transparency and public engagement, the Council’s initiatives support residents, businesses, and cultural institutions, ensuring a dynamic and forward-thinking environment.
www.havering.gov.uk

Arts Council England
Arts Council England is the national development agency for creativity and culture. Our vision, set out in our strategy Let’s Create, is that by 2030, we want England to be a country in which the creativity of each of us is valued and given the chance to flourish, and where every one of us has access to a remarkable range of high-quality cultural experiences. Between 2023 and 2026 we will have invested over £467 million of public money from Government, alongside an estimated £250 million each year from The National Lottery, to help ensure that people in every part of the country have access to culture and creativity in the places where they live. Until Autumn 2025, the National Lottery is celebrating its 30th anniversary of supporting good causes in the United Kingdom: since the first draw was held in 1994, it has raised £49 billion and awarded more than 690,000 individual grants.
www.artscouncil.org.uk

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.
www.heritagefund.org.uk

Follow @HeritageFundUK on Twitter/X, Facebook and Instagram and use #NationalLottery #HeritageFund

Romford BID
A business-led, business-funded initiative designed to elevate Romford’s commercial profile, Romford BID enhances the local economy through investment in marketing, events, and urban improvements. Strategic partnerships across sectors reinforce Romford’s identity as a key hub for retail, leisure, and business.
www.romfordbid.co.uk

Historic England
We are Historic England, the public body that protects and brings life to the heritage that matters to us all, so it lives on and is loved for longer. From the extraordinary to the everyday, our historic places and spaces matter. From community centres to cathedrals, homes to high streets, markets to mills – there are special places we all choose to hold onto, the legacy we want to pass on and the stories we continue to tell. That’s why we work together with people across England to discover, protect and bring new life to our shared historic environment, providing advice, knowledge, support and services.
www.historicengland.org.uk

Havering Changing
Havering Changing is an Arts Council England Creative People and Places project that puts local people at the heart of shaping their own creative and cultural offer in communities across Havering. Working with local partners and Change Makers, the programme delivers public art, events, workshops, and creative hubs that bring people together; transforms everyday spaces into places where creativity thrives; and ensures that culture strengthens communities.
www.haveringchanging.org

Royal Central School of Speech and Drama
A leading conservatoire and a constituent college of the University of London, the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama is a hub for innovation in theatre and performance. Specialising in acting, applied theatre, movement, scenography, voice, and technical production, the institution fosters interdisciplinary collaboration through research, teaching, and professional engagement with the creative industries. Central’s Centre for Performance, Technology, and Equity (PTEQ) is dedicated to innovating ground-breaking approaches to immersive and digital technologies from a performance-led perspective, in tandem with promoting social equity.
www.cssd.ac.uk/research/pteq

Media Contacts:

For further information, interviews, and press materials, please contact
Mathew Russell mathew@variablematter.com

Cover Image: Stuart Harper