Welcome to your December Newsletter!

Welcome to our last newsletter of 2025, and thank you you for joining us for this bumper year of grants, projects and programmes. 

Read on to find out how our Growing Together museum cohorts have been using their grants to build inclusive futures, and don't forget to sign up to our two January Peer Networking sessions.

In this newsletter you can expect to find opportunities for training with Digital Culture Network, Accreditation mentor workshops, and decarbonisation guidance from Arts Council England and Historic England. 

In January 2026 we're bringing you our winter skills programme, dates for our popular grants programme, and update on our Hazards in Collections project. See you in the new year!

As we approach the end of 2025, we’re taking the opportunity to reflect on the difference grants are making to museums participating in the National Lottery Heritage Fund funded Growing Together project.

Grants have been instrumental in supporting participating museums to embed Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI) into their practices, helping to ensure that heritage spaces are welcoming and accessible for all. Returning Travelling Together museums have received up to £5,000 each and museums that came on board for the first time during Growing Together have received up to £3,000 each (£4,000 for multi-site museums). Read our update to find out what’s been happening thanks to these grants!

Also, our Growing Together Champions are running three Peer Networking sessions over December and January, covering topics such as anti-discrimination practice, co-curation, and using dance and collections to promote EDI. Find out more and book your place on our website.

Join us and Digital Culture Network for an insightful training session in audience research basics and learn how to collect audience research data.

Audience research is a vital activity to inform a museum's strategy, audience development and marketing. It's a long-term process, and it can be challenging to get it right. The session, designed especially for museums, will cover survey design, data quality and collection strategies to inform marketing and strategy.

We are running these free training sessions on Tuesday 27 January and Thursday 5 March 2026, so you can pick a date which suits you. Find out more and book your ticket through Eventbrite.

In early November, 40 representatives from 18 Dorset museums came together in Highcliffe Castle,Christchurch, to celebrate all the amazing achievements of 2025 and anticipate a kaleidoscope of activity for the year ahead. The focus of the conference was Celebrating & Conserving Collections.

It was a great opportunity for skill sharing and networking. The conference featured exemplary case studies from Shaftesbury Abbey Museum, Sherborne Museum, Dorset History Centre and Russell Cotes Art Gallery & Museum. Sherborne Museum shared the story of their grant funded venture to research and digitise a remarkable collection of 1000 glass plate negatives, and inspired others with the depth and quality of their historical research and commitment to collections care. Shaftesbury Abbey talked through their Arts Council England funded project to conserve and display a rare religious medieval statue. Russell Cotes Art Gallery and Museum spoke about their exceptional collaborative exhibition project with Purbeck’s community museums to conserve and showcase outstanding fine art, depicting the picturesque Purbecks, in the highly successful Spirit of Place - Artists in Purbeck exhibition.

Our Conservation Development Officer turned quizmaster for an excellent interactive primer on the perennial demands of managing museum collections! Everyone enjoyed the opportunity to hear more about collections activity right across the South West region.

Museums across Dorset, Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole nominated colleagues for a popular Volunteers of the Year award scheme and 10 colleagues were recognised for their outstanding contributions, including Sylvia Hixson Andrews and Mark Churchill from Blandford Museum, shown above receiving their certificates from Claire Dixon, Director of Dorset Museum & Art Gallery and our Dorset Museum Development Officer.

Decarbonisation Guidance, Templates and Factsheets

Arts Council England and Historic England have co-funded the Cultural and Heritage Sector Decarbonisation Project Pilot to support cultural and heritage organisations responsible for historic buildings better understand the steps involved in developing decarbonisation plans.

The first part of the suite of guidance, templates and factsheets are now up on the Historic England website. The resources are written for cultural and heritage organisations that own, manage or occupy historic buildings, whether they are listed or not.

These resources provide a guide to steps involved in developing a decarbonisation plan, from gathering information to creating a decarbonisation pathway. They include factsheets on the different types of surveys, assessments and expected competencies of professionals undertaking this work.

The remaining case studies, decarbonisation plans and technical reports will be uploaded later this year.

Accreditation Mentor Workshops

Arts Council England, in partnership with Museum Development and UK partners, are running two workshops for Accreditation Mentors and those who'd like to learn more about being an Accreditation mentor.

Any museum professional with three or more years of experience can become an Accreditation Mentor. 

Becoming an Accreditation Mentor will give you all the information you need to decide whether the role of Mentor is for you, and will run online on Tuesday 20 January 2026, from 11am to 12pm. 

Being an Accreditation Mentor is an opportunity to get the latest mentorship updates and meet with your community of Accreditation Mentors. This workshop will run online on Tuesday 24 February 2026 from 11am to 12pm.

Heritage Open Days Festival Report 2025

The results are in from this year’s Heritage Open Days! This year was the biggest and best festival yet with 5,879 events delivered by the festival community, 1.3 million visitors enjoying more places to visit and stories to explore than ever before, and £11.9m of additional spend at sites and in the local area. Read the full evaluation report from England’s largest festival of history and culture.

Creative Partnerships, Collaborations and Networks

Creative Lives are running a micro-grant competition all about the power of networks and how they can help groups achieve things they couldn't on their own. 

Have you partnered with another group to great effect? Solved problems together, shared resources, or brought about a wonderful collaboration?

Tell Creative Lives your story, and they'll give a £250 micro-grant to their favourite. The deadline for submissions is Friday 12 December 2025.

Local Studies Publication & E-publication Awards (Alan Ball Award)

The object of these awards is to encourage the production of high quality publicly or locally funded local history publications. There are three categories to enter; Print publication, E-publication, Community Award. The publication needs to have appeared between January and December 2025.

They especially welcome submissions from libraries, archives, museum and archaeology services, small local museums and heritage centres, Local History societies, community history projects and local authors. Winners will be given a certificate, the use of a winner’s logo and accorded the title of Alan Ball Award winner, which can be used on promotional material. Nominations must be submitted by end of January 2026.

The best ways to get in touch are via the form on our website or emailing museum.development@bristol.gov.uk

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Photo credits (in order as they appear):

• Museum Development South West (MDSW)
• Aerospace Bristol
• Digital Culture Network
• MDSW
• Canva

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