In October 2025, The National Lottery Heritage Fund named Barking and Dagenham as one of the many places who will benefit from up to £200 million of investment as part of their 'Heritage Places' initiative. 

The initiative responds to local need and opportunity, supporting places to use heritage to build pride in place, inspire local communities and power regeneration.

Barking and Dagenham is a vibrant and diverse Borough, with a strong, evolving history we are proud of. Our Heritage and Culture Strategy lays out our key priorities which centre around the following six areas:

1. Ensure culture and creativity are a powerful force to shape change in our borough.
2. Develop vibrant cultural infrastructure across the borough, ensuring residents have access to arts, heritage and culture in their everyday lives through inclusive, community-centred schemes.
3. Support delivery of the borough’s Joint Health and Wellbeing Strategy, ensuring we support the three key themes: “best start in life”, “ageing well” and “living well’’
4. Champion the creative sector on the ground by supporting growth and skill development for culture and heritage organisations, staff, and individual artists working in the borough
5. Build our strategic approach to bring visitors to our borough, sharing our cultural and heritage initiatives more widely and linking to broader creative sector networks across London and the UK.
6. Develop a robust, high quality creative offer for people at all life stages through formal, informal and work-based learning, ensuring residents have access to engaging opportunities and stronger pathways to careers in the creative industries. 

As our local community grows and changes, we will continue to adapt our Culture and Heritage offer to meet the needs of everyone, ensuring all local residents feel welcome across our cultural and heritage, and are reflected in the programming and policy initiatives we deliver. We want to strengthen Barking and Dagenham’s existing heritage offer and support as many people and communities as possible to celebrate Barking and Dagenham’s people, places and stories.

About the Culture & Heritage Service

The Culture & Heritage Service’s key sites Eastbury Manor House, Valence House Museum, Archives and Local Studies Centre, the Women’s Museum and the Galleon Arts Centre each hold within them the potential to courageously celebrate the intersection of identities, experiences and perspectives represented through our community. These sites are platforms for fostering creativity and building understanding amongst local people.

Eastbury Manor House, a National Trust site managed by Barking and Dagenham Council, is one of London’s last remaining Tudor houses. The moated Valence House Museum dates from medieval times. Visit the museum galleries to find out more about the history of the house and Barking and Dagenham’s heritage, view some fine portraits of the Fanshawe family, or visit their tranquil gardens and tearoom. Dig deeper into your own family history or research a Barking and Dagenham’s rich and varied past in the Archive and Local Studies Centre on site. Barking Abbey was founded in c.666 AD and is continues to be celebrated as part of Barking Town centres identity. The only surviving buildings from this religious complex are the Curfew Tower and St Margaret’s Church. 

You can find out more here: Museum, History and Culture | London Borough of Barking and Dagenham

About the Heritage Fund

The National Lottery Heritage Fund is the largest funder for the UK’s heritage. Using money raised by National Lottery players, The National Lottery Heritage Fund support projects that connect people and communities to heritage.

Their vision is for heritage to be valued, cared for and sustained for everyone, now and in the future. From historic buildings, our industrial legacy and the natural environment, to collections, traditions, stories and more. Heritage can be anything from the past that people value and want to pass on to future generations. The National Lottery Heritage Fund 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.

Find out more about The National Lottery Heritage Fund.