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Places of Worship Renewal Fund

The Places of Worship Renewal Fund (PWRF) supports urgent repairs and essential improvements to listed places of worship in England. Grants ranging from £10,000 to £1,000,000 will be awarded for capital works that keep buildings safe, open and in public use. Any listed place of worship in England can apply, of any faith or denomination, provided it is an active place of worship.

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Contents

Summary

The Places of Worship Renewal Fund (PWRF) supports urgent repairs and essential improvements to listed places of worship in England.

Grants ranging from £10,000 to £1,000,000 will be awarded for capital works that keep buildings safe, open and in public use.      

Priority will be given to projects in areas of England with the highest level of deprivation and need for investment, and those that bring most community benefit. 

In order to support different sizes of project, the fund will be divided into three streams.  These are: 

 ●       £10,000 – £50,000 (small grants)

●       £50,001 – £350,000 (medium grants) 

●       £350,001 – £1,000,000 (large grants)

The fund is competitive, and not all applications will be successful. The full requirements of the fund are set out on our website, which provides details on the priorities, criteria, and objectives that all applications will be assessed against.

Eligibility

Any listed place of worship in England can apply, of any faith or denomination, provided it is an active place of worship

Projects must must be based in England and must involve a building listed at Grade I, Grade II* or Grade II. 

Projects must involve an active place of worship.  An active place of worship is one that is used for worship a minimum of six times per year or is owned by a charity that specifically cares for a historic places of worship (such as the Historic Churches Trust and Friends of Friendless Churches) that is open to the public a minimum of six times per year.

Objectives

The Places of Worship Renewal Fund’s objectives are to:

  1. Repair and safeguard historic places of worship in places most in need by undertaking the repairs that keep them in use.

  2. Help places of worship stay active as community spaces 

  3. Strengthen long-term resilience of the building and reduce future repair costs 

  4. Target support in the most deprived areas of England where need is highest.

Dates

The deadline for submitting EOIs for the first round of grants is 14th June 2026. Further rounds of grants will follow in September 2026 and in future years.

How to apply

For this fund we ask applicants to complete an expression of interest (EOI).  If your EOI is successful, you will be invited to make a full application.

To submit an EOI, you need to fill in our online form.  

You will also need to refer to the PWRF requirements on our website. In the EOI form we will ask you to briefly describe how your project meets these.

You will need to provide enough information at EOI stage to enable Historic England to consider the need for your project. If your project is not yet sufficiently developed you may wish to delay your EOI and apply in a later round.

Supporting information