Hastings Museum & Art Gallery secures Natural History Museum funding

Hastings Museum & Art Gallery has been announced as one of 12 museums, heritage and cultural partners across the UK to run events and activity focused on creating advocates for the planet, in partnership with the Natural History Museum, London. 

The Fixing Our Broken Planet: Interconnected programme provides funding, displays, and access to scientists, to support activity which works with communities towards a more hopeful future. 

Cllr Julia Hilton, lead for regeneration, culture, tourism, and community wealth building at Hastings Borough Council, explained: “Hastings is a vibrant town with a growing community focused on climate action and social change and our museum already has a great track record in engaging our local community in all aspects of their work. So, we are delighted to have secured £10,000 in funding from the Natural History Museum to deliver our ‘Material World’ project. 

The project will explore geological materials and their role in sustainability through the museum's mineralogy and petrology collections, involving a curator-in-residence and collaboration with local secondary schools and young people. 

The findings will inform a new exhibit, a family-friendly learning trail at the museum, and a digital resource for schools to use to educate pupils. The project aims to educate, connect and empower people in Hastings to take action and will run from March 2025 until March 2026.”

Tom Bevan, Head of National Programmes, Natural History Museum, said: “We’re proud to support the fantastic work our partners are doing to empower communities to connect with issues facing the natural world. Across the country, we interact with nature in different ways. This programme is perfectly placed to amplify stories from different communities and drive meaningful action for a future where people and planet thrive.”

This programme is part of Fixing Our Broken Planet at the Natural History Museum, which includes the opening of a new permanent gallery, Fixing Our Broken Planet, in April 2025. 

The funding opportunity was made available to members of the Fixing Our Broken Planet: Community of Practice, a museum sector network established in September 2023 to create advocates for the planet. Over the coming years, it will continue to support 200+ organisations to connect communities at a local, national and global level with the science surrounding the planetary emergency to build a truly global advocacy movement. To find out more, or to join the community, click here. 

The Natural History Museum has received funding from a wide variety of trusts, foundations, companies and individuals who generously supported the Fixing Our Broken Planet gallery and programme including Natural Environment Research Council (NERC), part of UK Research and Innovation, Wellcome and GSK.

In addition to funding, partners will have access to NHM scientists and researchers, and content drawn from the new permanent gallery, Fixing Our Broken Planet, announced to open in April 2025.