Ealing Fails to Become London Borough of Culture
Bid for 2025 lost out to Wandsworth
The launch of the Ealing bid last October
March 12, 2024
Ealing Council has failed in its bid to become London Borough of Culture for 2025.
In the event, the Mayor’s team announced Wandsworth as the winner this Monday (11 March) and it will now be given £1.35 million worth of funding to but on a series of events and activities during its tenure.
Haringey will also receive £1.35m to hold the biannual title in 2027.
Ealing was relatively slow out of the blocks in announcing its bid last October just a month before the deadline whereas Wandsworth had been promoting its submission since June.
The council posted on social media, “Congratulations to Wandsworth and Haringey on becoming London Borough of Culture 2025 and 2027. We had great fun bringing Ealing’s cultural wizards together to create the bid and we’ll do much of what was in the bid anyway.
Thank you to all of our creative partners, the businesses who backed us and to all of you who showed your support for our bid. We plan on seeking funding elsewhere for some of the great ideas generated in our bid. “
The Mayor said the award has become a “cornerstone in the capital’s calendar” adding, “We’ve seen the difference that it’s made in winning boroughs Waltham Forest, Brent, Lewisham and Croydon, and I’m excited to see Wandsworth and Haringey’s fantastic ideas come to life as we build a better London for all.”
Barnet, Merton and Greenwich were also named as Cultural Impact Award winners. They will receive up to £200,000 to deliver smaller-scale creative projects.
The programme was initiated in 2017 and Waltham Forest was the first winner and it claims to have attracted 500,000 visitors and left a legacy, with Fellowship Square becoming a cultural hub of festivals and programming. In Brent a worldwide audience of 13.3million tuned in for a podcast series created by young people in the borough and for every £1 spent by Brent Council, it says an additional £2 was raised from other funders. In Lewisham, the council says there was £1.1m in additional spend in the local area and more than 8,000 young people were supported with training and careers advice to access jobs in the creative sector.
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