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Success for heritage projects in the National Lottery Awards

Success for heritage projects in the National Lottery Awards

Danny Renton holding his National Lottery Award
Danny Renton with his National Lottery Award for best environment project.
Leaders from two projects we’ve funded have taken home a prize this year, and there’s still more announcements to come.

Danny Renton is working to restore lost biodiversity, create green jobs and improve marine science and conservation education in Scotland.

His community-led charity, Seawilding, received £216,000 from us in 2020 to restore the native oyster beds of Loch Craignish, Argyll. He hopes to create a self-sustaining population and potentially a community fishery.

And now his efforts have been recognised with the National Lottery Award for environment projects.

Danny being presented his award by Ray Mears on the shore of the loch.
Danny being presented his award by survival expert and environmentalist Ray Mears.

Danny said: “Thank you so much for the confidence you had in us to give us the funding, to enable us to do what we've done. I think you've inspired lots of other projects like this.

“Communities around the UK realise that they can get involved, can do something active to restore marine ecosystems. And I think we're never going to stop that now, it's off and it's away. Thank you to the National Lottery for getting it going.”

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Celebrating heritage that’s making a difference

Danny joins fellow Heritage Fund grantee, Esther Fox, who won the National Lottery Award for heritage projects.

Esther was recognised for her work on the Curating for Change project – which received £1.06m from us in 2020 ­– creating career opportunities for D/deaf, disabled and neurodivergent people in the museum sector.

Esther with Tony Robinson stood beside her and the National Lottery award on a plinth next to them
Esther being awarded her National Lottery Award by historian and actor Sir Tony Robinson.

She said: “This isn’t just a win for me, this is a win for all of us that are trying to champion what disabled people can offer.”

More inspirational people and projects

The National Lottery Awards celebrate the inspirational people and projects who do extraordinary things with money raised by National Lottery players.

Since 1994, more than £47billion from ticket sales has gone towards good causes. We have distributed £8.2bn of this to more than 46,000 projects across the UK.

There are seven awards still to be announced – including the projects of the year for each nation, which were chosen through more than 20,000 public votes. The rest of the winners will be revealed between now and December.

Find out who else has won a National Lottery Award or explore more of the inspirational projects we’ve supported over the years.

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