UK Town of Culture is a designation given to a town for one year, as a companion to the UK City of Culture scheme. All towns outside of Greater London without city status are eligible to apply. Three finalists are chosen, the winner receives £3 million, the two runner ups receive £250,000, with the money going towards local culture.
It was founded by Lisa Nandy and launched on 30 October 2025. Applications for the first title closed on 31 March 2026. The first title will be awarded for the year 2028 and will be chosen by a panel led by Phil Redmond.
A shortlist was due to be announced in Spring 2026 with shortlisted towns awarded £60,000 to work up their bids into a more detailed proposal. However, at the end of May, all towns that had submitted expressions of interest were emailed to say that: 'As a result of the exceptional response we have received, the expert advisory panel require additional time to assess all of the bids, and we will now announce the shortlisted towns by the end of July.'
There will be 3 finalists: one from each category of large, medium and small town.
Between 100 and 200 towns are thought to have submitted an Expression of Interest by 31 March, although not all of these have made their bids public. Research by the Daily Telegraph and other sources has revealed around 100 contenders for the title: more than 80 from England, 8 from Wales, 5 from Scotland and 1 from Northern Ireland. EnglandScotlandWalesNorthern IrelandLarge towns (greater than 75,000)Bournemouth-Christchurch-Poole Burton upon Trent Crewe Eastbourne Grimsby Halifax Harrogate Hastings Huddersfield Newcastle-under-Lyme Northampton Redditch St Helens WorthingN/AN/AN/AMedium towns (20-75,000 pop)Accrington Barnsley Beeston Bishop Auckland Boston Bridgwater Bridlington Bury St Edmunds Chorley Coalville Congleton Falmouth Felixstowe Great Yarmouth Hinckley Huntingdon Keighley Leigh-on-Sea Lowestoft Melton Mowbray Newquay North Shields Penzance Royal Leamington Spa Scarborough Shrewsbury Skegness Spalding St Neots Thetford Warwick Witham Greenock Port TalbotN/ASmall towns (less than 20,000 pop)Amesbury Ashby-de-la-Zouch Barnard Castle Berwick-upon-Tweed Bridgnorth Broseley Conisbrough Guiseley Helmsley Helston Henley-on-Thames Ilkley Kimberley Kirkby Lonsdale Knutsford Ledbury Leominster Ludlow Lymington and Pennington Marazion Mere Oswestry Pocklington Redruth Richmond Rochford Ross-on-Wye Rye Sandown, Isle of Wight Settle St Ives Warminster Watchet Waveney ValleyDunbar Haddington Penicuik StornowayAbergavenny Caerleon Hay-on-Wye Holyhead Llandrindod Wells Machynlleth Presteigne Strabane
Notes
References