The Y has been awarded £707,500 through the Heritage Lottery Fund’s pioneering “Kick the Dust” funding programme. This will fund our project “Y Heritage”, which will be a collaboration between The Y, key civic partners such as our universities and local authorities, and the city and county’s wide and brilliant variety of heritage, cultural and creative organisations. The money will be used to better engage young people with heritage across both city and county. With thanks to National Lottery Players for their support, without them projects such as Y Heritage could not happen.

Y Heritage will run a series of “Dragons Den” style pitches over three years where Leicester/Leicestershire based organisations can apply for funding up to £30,000 from a panel of young people. The young people all engage in some way with The Y. The organisations must build opportunities for work or training into their project funding application. Our aim is that our young people and the heritage projects develop and thrive together – it really is a win win opportunity!

What is Heritage?

Heritage is really wide-ranging and includes many things from the past that should be preserved for future generations. This does not mean it is solely historic sites or buildings; see below a list of things that make up our heritage. For an understanding of Heritage in all its many forms have a look at some projects supported by the Heritage Lottery Fund.

• archaeological sites;
• books or documents;
• cultural traditions;
• historic buildings;

• people and communities;
• places and events;
• languages and dialects;
• landscapes and gardens;

• memories and experiences;
• places and objects;
• natural heritage.

Sanctuaries: Looking for Safe Spaces

ArtReach were awarded Y Heritage funding in October 2018, have a look at what they did with their Y Heritage funding here: ⇒

The New Custodian: Leicester Print Workshop

Following the progress of the restoration of a c.1840s Columbian Printing Press. From pallets to printing!

Leicester Cares Project

The Leicestershire Cares funded project involves care experienced youth working together to discover, create and promote positive cultural histories about care. With this project, excellent progress is being made through the use of Heritage Caption Cards. These cards are used as prompts and discussion starters to get engaged and thinking about different aspects of care. The use of photovoice and photo-elicitation has also been key to help prompt positive memories of care.