Plymouth to bid for UK City of Culture, with £10 million in funding on offer for year-long cultural celebration of our city and what makes it so special to the UK
Plymouth has announced its intention to bid for the title of UK City of Culture 2029, with £10 million of funding for a year-long celebration of arts and culture awarded to the winning city. This is an invitation to everyone to make life an adventure in Plymouth 2029 and join the celebration.
Securing the title will give Plymouth the opportunity to celebrate the people and places that make the city so vibrant, while supporting the city’s wider ambitions for inclusive growth and regeneration. Plymouth City of Culture 2029 will celebrate our proud city shaped by the sea and its dynamic histories.
From music, performance, heritage and visual arts to film, festivals, sport and community-led projects, the bid will showcase the breadth of creativity already thriving across Plymouth, and our pioneering approach to marine research to health, social enterprise to volunteering.
It will also create space for new voices, new ideas and new ways for people to take part in culture across the city, helping to shape places, strengthen communities and improve access to opportunity.
The bid to become the UK’s City of Culture builds on the momentum Plymouth has created after more than a decade of sustained investment in arts and culture. It’s a chance to showcase Plymouth’s strengths as a coastal city, and how it embraces its waterfront identity as an example to other cities particularly those with coastal communities.
It aligns closely with the city’s wider priorities, including city centre regeneration, new neighbourhoods and housing, and Plymouth’s unique role as a centre for defence and innovation, showing how culture can support placemaking, skills development and wellbeing alongside economic growth.
The prestigious national competition is led by the Government’s Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) and runs every four years. Bradford currently holds the title, with previous winners including Derry/Londonderry (2013), Hull (2017) and Coventry (2021).
Longlisted places will receive £60,000 to support the development of their bids, with the overall winner receiving £10 million in prize funding. The competition has a strong track record of unlocking long-term cultural, social and economic benefits for places, helping to drive regeneration, civic pride and inclusive growth.
Experience from previous host cities shows that the title can also help attract significant additional investment, supporting jobs, skills, infrastructure and community development well beyond the programme year itself.
Plymouth previously bid for City of Culture in 2017. Since then, the city’s cultural landscape has changed significantly, and it is ready to show the nation what a coastal city can achieve when creativity sits at the heart of its ambitions.
More than a decade of sustained investment has helped establish strong cultural infrastructure, a rich ecology of artists and organisations, and confident, collaborative leadership across the sector. The 2029 bid represents an opportunity to build on these foundations and demonstrate how a coastal city like Plymouth can reimagine its future, drawing on its history, its communities and its global connections.
Cllr Jemima Laing said: “This is an incredibly exciting moment for Plymouth to show the power of creativity to improve the lives of everyone. This gives us an opportunity to put culture at the heart of our city plans, supporting regeneration, new jobs and investment while ensuring growth is inclusive and benefits communities across the city.
“The City Council has asked Victoria Pomery, CEO of The Box and Head of Culture for Plymouth City Council, and Hannah Harris, CEO of Plymouth Culture, to lead on the bid to become City of Culture. Both are extremely well placed to do so and are at the heart of two of the city’s strategic cultural organisations.”
Victoria Pomery, CEO of The Box and Head of Culture, said: “This is a real now or never moment for Plymouth a city so intrinsically linked to the UK’s histories. We have spent years building the cultural partnerships and infrastructure that will enable Plymouth to live up to the title of City of Culture, and the timing aligns perfectly with the wider ambition for growth, regeneration and opportunity in the city.”
Hannah Harris, CEO of Plymouth Culture, said: “Plymouth is a city that embraces culture from football to food, Beryl Cook to Joshua Reynolds, history to adventure. This competition gives us an opportunity to show the UK, and beyond, how a key coastal city can use creativity to reimagine its future, amplify the voices of its communities and drive a new form of sustainable regeneration and growth.”
The development of the bid will take place with the full backing of Plymouth City Council and partners from across the city.
An initial Expression of Interest will be submitted by 8 February 2026, with a full bid to follow in summer 2026 should Plymouth be longlisted. A programme of creative community engagement will sit at the heart of the bid process and will begin from January 19th 2026, ensuring that people across Plymouth can get involved, share their ideas and help shape the city’s vision for UK City of Culture 2029. Details of creative community drop-in sessions will be shared on the Plymouth Culture and Plymouth City council websites.
To find out more, visit plymouthculture.co.uk/city-of-culture
