Arts Council England National Portfolio Funding 2026-2029: Creative People and Places
The Arts Council’s Creative People and Places programme focuses on parts of the country where involvement in creativity and culture is significantly below the national average. The programme will fund partnerships in local areas to empower residents to decide what kind of creative activity they want to experience on their doorstep. A video providing an overview of the programme is available on the Arts Council website.
The aims of the programmes are:
1. Engage more people from eligible places in a wide range of arts and cultural experiences as audiences and/or participants.
2. Empower communities to lead and shape local cultural provision.
3. Excellence and relevance in both the engagement process and the creative and cultural experiences on offer.
4. Encourage partnerships between publicly funded, amateur, voluntary, community and commercial sectors, as well as collaboration across various cultural institutions, and
5. Take an Action Research approach to community engagement in arts, creativity, and culture; learn what works best and share that learning.
Applicants can apply for between £750,000 and £1,000,000 for a 3-year period regardless of the number of eligible places they are applying to cover. The Arts Council will be looking for a 15% matched funding contribution from applicants.
Applications should be made by a consortium of organisations, including at least one arts or cultural organisation and one community and/or grassroots organisation. Please note that the organisation representing the community (grassroots or other) cannot be an arts or cultural organisation. If there is only a community organisation and no grassroots organisation on the consortium – there must be a demonstrable mechanism for grassroots groups to shape the programme. For the purposes of this programme, a grassroots community organisation is a non-arts/non-cultural, volunteer-led organisation. National Portfolio Organisations (NPOs) can only apply if the activity proposed is in addition to their funded activity.
South West (eligible locations)
Gloucester
Isle of Wight
Isles of Scilly
New Forest
North Devon
North Somerset
Plymouth
Portsmouth
Rushmoor
Sedgemoor
South Somerset
A lead applicant must apply on behalf of a partnership of organisations to carry out activities in one or more of 142 eligible locations in England. These are listed in full below, using the Arts Council’s geographic categorisations.
Activities must be delivered over 3 years, commence on Wednesday 1st April 2026 and end on Saturday 31st March 2029.
After reviewing the guidance and considering your application, you musthave a detailed conversation with an Arts Council England Senior/Relationship Manager in your area. This introductory conversation must take place before Thursday 19th December 2024. The deadline for booking an introductory conversation isMonday 9th December 2024. To schedule the conversation, contact the Arts Council’s Customer Services team on 0161 934 4317 or email [email protected]. The lead applicant must book and attend the conversation, while other consortium members are also encouraged to participate.
If you’re eligible and interested in either leading an application or becoming a partner on a consortium, the Arts Council recommends you sign up to its Register of Interest to start forming your connections. By registering, you’ll receive notifications about the programme guidance, briefing events, and application portal opening. The Arts Council will also use it to share your details with other partners in your eligible place, so you can start to have conversations with each other. To register your interest, please go to the Arts Council website.
Further information, guidance notes and how to apply is available on the Arts Council website.