The Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) has announced the 23 successful applicants set to benefit from the second incarnation of its £5m Collecting Cultures programme.

The programme, which first ran in 2008, funds museums, libraries and archives to strategically purchase items for their core collections over a five-year period. The first round of the programme enabled organisations to collect more than 2,000 objects.

The successful applicants in this round include Amgueddfa Cymru (National Museum Wales), in partnership with The Federation of Museums and Art Galleries of Wales and the Portable Antiquities Scheme in Wales, which was awarded £349,000 for a project entitled Saving Treasures, Telling Stories.

The North West was a big beneficiary, with five museums in the region awarded funding: Manchester Art Gallery, the Fusilier Museum in Bury, National Museums Liverpool's International Slavery Museum, the People’s History Museum in Manchester, and the National Football Museum.

In Scotland, the Scottish Maritime Museum, won £412,000 for its project, SMMart: Enriching the Imagery of Scotland’s Maritime Heritage, while in Northern Ireland, National Museums Northern Ireland was awarded £370,000 for an initiative entitled Collecting the Troubles and Beyond.

Meanwhile the Scott Polar Research Institute in Cambridge won £500,000 to develop a collection on Ernest Shackleton’s Endurance expedition.

Carole Souter, the chief executive of the HLF, said: “HLF is the only funding body that currently offers this type of advance funding support for museums, libraries and archives. Building on past success, a second incarnation of the initiative is back by popular demand. 

“This upfront investment of £5m will enable a diverse range of collections, including children’s literature, robotics, fashion, football and the Black art movement, to be strengthened and enlivened.

"Curators will be able to ‘go shopping’ with their HLF grant, researching to identify works of art, images and objects that they would like to purchase over the five-year lifespan of their Collecting Cultures project.”

Collecting Cultures recipients

East Midlands

  • The National Trust, Exploring Childhoods (£228,900)

East of England

  • Scott Polar Research Institute, By Endurance We Conquer: the Shackleton Project (£500,000)
  • Fry Art Gallery Society, The Fry Going Forward (£199,000)

London

  • The Cartoon Museum, Comic Creators (£164,300)
  • Museum of London, Experimental Photography in London 1970-204 (£95,900)
  • Science Museum, A New Collecting Initiative Targeting 600 Years of Mechanism Created in Lifelike Form (£100,000)
  • Autograph ABP, Building Autograph ABP’s Collection of Photography, Expanding the Narratives on Black Representation(£96,800)

North East

  • Seven Stories, the Centre for Children’s Books, Collecting British Children’s Literature; Strategic Acquisitions to Develop the Seven Stories Collection (£341,500)

North West

  • Manchester Art Gallery, From Catwalk to High Street (£307,300)
  • Fusilier Museum, Enriching the Collection (£60,000)
  • National Museums Liverpool, the International Slavery Museum’s Transatlantic and Contemporary Slavery Collecting Project (£225,000)
  • People’s History Museum, Voting for Change – 150 years of Radical Movements for Democracy, 1819 to 1969 (£95,000)
  • National Football Museum, The Art of Football (£199,900)

Northern Ireland

  • National Museums Northern Ireland, Collecting the Troubles and Beyond (£370,000)

Scotland

  • University of Glasgow Archive Services, Darning Scotland’s Textile Collections: Recording, Identifying and Expanding Knowledge about Scotland’s Textile Heritage (£91,800)
  • Scottish Maritime Museum, SMMart: Enriching the Imagery of Scotland’s Maritime Heritage (£412,000)

South East

  • Royal Pavilion Museums Brighton and Hove,Fashioning Africa (£242,300)
  • Jane Austen House Museum, Jane Austen Bicentenary Collections Project (£191,600)

South West

  • Wiltshire Council, Creative Wiltshire and Swindon (£178,000)

Wales

  • Amgueddfa Cymru – National Museum Wales (in partnership with The Federation of Museums and Art Galleries of Wales and the Portable Antiquities Scheme in Wales), Saving Treasures, Telling Stories (£349,000)

West Midlands

  • Wolverhampton Art Gallery, Artists of the Black Movement in Britain 1979-1984 (£183,000)
  • The Birmingham Museums Trust, Representing Birmingham (£389,100)

Yorkshire and Humber

  • The Royal Armouries, Arms and Armour of Popular Culture (£98,000)