Major National Lottery grant awarded for first stage of Harewood’s landmark Reimagining project

Harewood House Trust has secured significant support from The National Lottery Heritage Fund to deliver the first stage of its landmark Reimagining Harewood project. The award marks a milestone in Harewood’s future and will support plans to save heritage, transform accessibility, welcome and engage visitors and share Harewood’s stories with new and existing audiences. Made possible thanks to National Lottery players, the funding will enable the development of a project to transform Harewood’s Grade II listed Bakehouse into a visitor centre: a welcoming new social and interpretation space, designed to make Harewood easier for all audiences to access and enjoy.

The redeveloped Bakehouse will include provision of accessible facilities including a Changing Places toilet, a new café linked to Harewood’s recently opened adventure playscape, retail and interpretation. The project has been designed with sustainability in mind and forms part of Harewood’s wider commitment to a low-carbon future. The Pleasure Grounds which connect the Bakehouse, House and Courtyard will be landscaped, restoring historic views and creating new paths down to the lakeside.

The new space will also provide opportunities for visitors to engage with Harewood’s history, including its connections to the transatlantic trade in enslaved individuals. Harewood House Trust has been actively researching, acknowledging and interpreting this history for more than 30 years but the new visitor centre will finally provide a space where Harewood’s history can be shared with all visitors. A new role of Curator of Community Voices will be funded by this grant to ensure that this interpretation is developed in close consultation with local communities, including descendant communities.

The Bakehouse project forms the first phase of the wider Reimagining Harewood programme, which also includes ambitious plans to restore and reimagine Harewood’s gardens and landscape. In 2023, Harewood worked with The Landscape Agency and award-winning garden designer and broadcaster Matthew Wilson to develop proposals for the South Garden and surrounding landscape. The development of the gardens aims to create more inclusive, environmentally resilient and engaging spaces, while helping visitors better understand Harewood’s heritage and its role within the wider Harewood Estate.

Commenting on the award, Rachel Crewes CEO at Harewood House Trust, said: “We are delighted to have received this support thanks to National Lottery players. This investment marks an important next step in our long-term vision for Reimagining Harewood. Entering the development phase allows us to undertake essential surveys, planning and community consultation work, ensuring that the project is shaped with input from local communities and key stakeholders. The development phase will run for approximately 18 months, during which we will continue to refine plans and secure additional funding for this transformational project, with the aim of a full completion by 2030, marking 7 years in the making.”

Helen Featherstone, Director, England, North at The National Lottery Heritage Fund, said: “We’re delighted to support Harewood House with this initial grant to work towards a strong and resilient future for this significant site, thanks to money raised by National Lottery players. It is fantastic news that Harewood House Trust can now further develop their plans to transform the Bakehouse into a new visitor centre to celebrate the important heritage of the site and improve access for all.”

About Harewood House Trust
Harewood House is managed by the Harewood House Trust, an independent educational charity responsible for conserving Harewood House for public benefit and the future. The Trust is leading the way to re-imagine what makes a historic house and its landscape relevant in the 21st century. Harewood House is the Grade I listed historic home of the Earl and Countess of Harewood, welcoming around 250,000 visitors annually. Building began in 1759 led by local architect John Carr, with interiors by Robert Adam and the largest single commission of Thomas Chippendale furniture. Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown designed the 100 acres of nationally significant gardens and landscapes. Inside the house, the collections include Renaissance masterpieces, family portraits by Reynolds and Gainsborough and fine Sèvres porcelain.

For over 30 years, David Lascelles and Diane Howse, the current Earl and Countess, have provoked different perspectives and conversations on Harewood House’s history, landscape and collections through collaborations and commissions with contemporary artists. Harewood House Trust has worked with artists including Anya Gallacio (1999), Mark Wallinger (2002), Sonia Boyce (2007) and Thomas J Price (2015). More recently they launched Harewood Biennial in 2019 and commissioned ‘Missing Portraits’, a new series of permanently displayed portraits including the founder of Leeds West Indian Carnival Arthur France MBE and actor David Harewood OBE. This bold engagement with historical narratives continues through the contemporary curatorial programme.

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. http://www.heritagefund.org.uk/ Please follow and tag @HeritageFundUK on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn and YouTube and use the hashtags #HeritageFund #NationalLottery