The search is on to find winners for this year's English Heritage Angel Awards. The annual competition was founded last year by Andrew Lloyd Webber to reward the efforts of local people in saving their heritage.
The Telegraph is media partner for the awards and the Awards are co-funded by the Andrew Lloyd Webber Foundation. www.andrewlloydwebberfoundation.com
Have you been involved in bringing a historic house back from the brink of ruin or restoring a church or chapel to its former glory? Have you perhaps reclaimed a historic garden buried beneath a wilderness or brought new life and a constant flow of visitors to a redundant industrial site? If so, Andrew Lloyd Webber and English Heritage would like to hear from you!
Andrew Lloyd Webber said: "I look forward to this year's Angel Awards and hope we can build on last year's success. Now that the selection criteria have been widened to include Grade II listed buildings, I hope even more Heritage Angels will take part. The people responsible for securing our country's treasures are at the heart of the Angel Awards and our goal is to recognise their work."
Simon Thurley, Chief Executive of English Heritage, said: "In founding the English Heritage Angel Awards it was Andrew Lloyd Webber's intention to shine the spotlight on people who dedicate vast amounts of time and energy to saving historic buildings, monuments and landscapes before they crumble and vanish from our history. If you are involved in rescuing a national or local treasure, please step forward and apply for an Angel award - or encourage others to apply. The future of England's heritage rests to a great extent on the efforts of local people and we want to share the good news of their many, extraordinary achievements."
For full details on how to enter for an English Heritage Angel Award, or to nominate someone else, visit www.english-heritage.org.uk/heritageangelawards. The deadline for applications is Friday 15 June.
Award categories
The English Heritage Angel Awards are for:
- the best rescue or repair of a historic place of worship
- the best rescue of a historic industrial building or site
- the best craftsmanship employed on a heritage rescue, and
- the best rescue of a listed building, scheduled monument, registered garden, landscape or battlefield, protected wreck or conservation area.
Widened criteria
In response to the great interest generated by last year's inaugural awards, the entry criteria have been widened. This year, rescues of Grade II buildings and sites will be eligible, as well rescues of Grade I and II* projects. The other major change is that projects no longer have to have been on the English Heritage Heritage at Risk Register, though they still have to have been significantly "at risk" of neglect and decay before being saved.
Judges
A panel of judges, to be chaired by Andrew Lloyd Webber, will include Melvyn Bragg, historian and television presenter Bettany Hughes, Charles Moore of the Daily Telegraph, the Bishop of London, the Right Revd Richard Chartres, and Simon Thurley, Chief Executive of English Heritage.
Sixteen shortlisted entrants, four in each award category, will be invited to a glittering ceremony at The Palace Theatre in London's West End in October at which the winners will be announced. The event will be hosted by well known television presenter Clare Balding, and Graham Norton will be among the celebrities who present the awards.
Last year's winners included the group who rescued Arnos Vale Cemetery in Bristol, the congregation of an inner-city church in Leeds, the owners of a medieval barn in Kent, the trust who have rescued landmark St Stephen's church in north London, a team of craftspeople and apprentices restoring the Orangery at Tyntesfield in Somerset and the former miners responsible for saving Pleasley Colliery in Nottinghamshire. To see BBC 2's Culture Show films of last year's shortlist and award winners visit the multimedia libray.
