Our new project Protection Through Connection: Safeguarding Intangible Cultural Heritage in Scotland aims to raise the profile of Scotland’s living traditions by building stronger relationships between cultural and heritage organisations and communities that maintain Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH).

Protection through Connection is made possible thanks to funding from The National Lottery Heritage Fund. Our ICH Project Officer Peter Hewitt and Collections and Interpretation Manager Jacob O’Sullivan are leading on the project, which is being delivered in partnership with Historic Environment Scotland and Traditional Arts & Culture Scotland.

Protection through Connection launches with an open call for information about ICH. This knowledge-gathering phase will be followed by a round of funding for partnerships between ICH practitioners and heritage sites in autumn 2025.

For the first phase of the project, we aim to build a more comprehensive picture of ICH practices across Scotland. This will support the creation of a National ICH Inventory which is due to be published later in 2025.

Individuals are invited to explore the ICH Scotland Wiki and inform Peter of any gaps. In calling for contributions, Peter said: “We know that the ICH Scotland Wiki isn’t an exhaustive list of traditions, but hopefully it will give you a sense of what we mean by ‘Intangible Cultural Heritage’. Please have a think about your communities and the customs, crafts, and beliefs that are being practiced in your region.”

Peter and Jacob are also calling for organisations to provide examples of their connections to local traditions or customs. This information will guide the funding phase of the project.

Funding will be made available in autumn 2025 to enable five mutually supportive partnerships between ‘tradition bearers’ of Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) and cultural or heritage organisations in Scotland. These organisations could include museums, galleries, heritage centres, libraries, archives, and other venues. Each partnership will be eligible to apply for up to £10,000 in funding. More information about this funding will be made available at a later date.

Jacob welcomed the launch of Protection through Connection, saying: ““ICH is community-driven and defined. As genuinely participatory community spaces and resources, museums and similar cultural organisations are ideally placed for supporting ICH. Likewise, communities that practice ICH are able to revitalise and diversify the meanings garnered from museum collections.

“This project will support the sector in developing exciting and innovative relationships between ICH communities and cultural organisations; this is the first project to take this approach, and has potential to be genuinely transformative for living heritage in Scotland”.