Greenwich will be making another bid to be London’s borough of culture – after a senior councillor admitted that the town hall’s emphasis on its “royal borough” status counted against it last time.
Winning boroughs get £1.35m from City Hall to put on a year of cultural events. Greenwich lost out in the last contest, held in 2020, to Lewisham and Croydon.
Adel Khaireh, the cabinet member for culture, told a scrutiny panel meeting earlier this month that Greenwich “did not highlight all of our borough” in its previous application, but would apply again for 2025 or 2027.
“When people hear about ‘Royal Greenwich’, they think about the world heritage site. There were gaps within our previous one that didn’t highlight the major work that happened around Thamesmead, Abbey Wood, Plumstead and Eltham. The golden thread was missing,” he said.
“We are going to focus on bringing real-life stories into this, [people’s] lived experience, and making sure that no part of the borough feels left out.”
Greenwich was declared a royal borough in 2012 to mark Queen Elizabeth II’s diamond jubilee and the royal family’s past links with Greenwich, Woolwich and Eltham. The council has referred to itself in the third person as “Royal Greenwich” and the “Royal Borough” ever since.
Lewisham branded its year in the spotlight under the “We are Lewisham” banner, asking residents to contribute while celebrating notable local people.
Without naming Lewisham, Khaireh said that Greenwich was “working with a local resident that helped a local borough win it last year – this one of our residents helping a different borough to win it and we haven’t utilised them”.
“We’re in talks with them to come on board to support their borough and they live in one of these parts of the borough that has always been neglected.”
Waltham Forest was the first borough of culture, in 2019, followed by Brent, which had to quickly switch to remote events during 2020. The pandemic led to Lewisham’s year being delayed to 2022, while Croydon is the current borough of culture.
Lewisham held 696 events during the year, with over 436,000 visitors. Its programme included a number of outdoor festivals, new public artworks and local history projects where residents were invited to contribute their own memories of the area’s culture.