NMN AWARDED FUNDING FOR NEXT 3 YEARS (2026-2029)

We’re thrilled to be announced as part of Arts Council England’s Creative People and Places (CPP) Portfolio, seeing £42M invested in 45 programmes across the UK to 2029, to deliver more grassroots-led cultural experiences, we are continuing our mission across the county as we invest funding of £1,050,000 into the creative and cultural lives of our area from 2026 - 2029.

We’re working to ensure that nobody in Co. Durham should be left behind by culture and that Co. Durham is Co. Created with its people and places.

NMN was developed with our creative communities, becoming the cultural rallying cry that they needed to act as hope in hard times and a source of community empowerment. As a CPP for County Durham, NMN is about creative courage, togetherness and nurturing creative and cultural talent - connecting opportunity and making change that lasts.

As many will know, we are radically inclusive, allowing our people to redefine what it is to be from County Durham and where we’re going next.

We're advocating for the people that some forgot, but we did not. We embody County Durham’s proud Unionist past, placing equity and justice at our core. We listen to, enable and welcome people who might not believe they have a place in culture, a voice in creativity, or a creative career. Our mission is for people in County Durham to believe that there is something for them here, by co-creating it together. 

We are very much looking forward to building on our past achievements, working with our partners and communities to shared almost 500,000 co-created moments with local people, across over 15,000 hours of activity, working with 1,719 artists. Interestingly, on average 96% of our engagers didn't regularly engage with culture. We’re here to bring them central to the county’s conversations and plans for a thriving culture county where grass-roots culture is the beating heart driving the generation of new, more positive stories and destinations for the places we call home.

In 2022, our delivery remit expanded from East Durham - to county-wide, seeing our community grow by more than 450% - and our delivery area increased by 1500%

Please join us, engage with us and meet us as we develop exciting plans and projects moving towards 2029. We mean it.

THANK YOU  to everyone who has been part of our success over the past decade - funders, partners, consortium members, residents, community organisations, project partners and the NMN team pivotal to our success; Jess Hunt, Faye Watson, Aaron Bowman, Eilis McGowan, OGRE Studio, Ellen Ranson, Vonni Hardman - and many more ✊