UK City of Culture Swindon 2029 Bid
Swindon is proud to have been longlisted for UK City of Culture 2029 and we need your help to win! #Swindon2029 #WeDreamInPublic
A town that dreams in public
Swindon has always been a place where people build the future – from the railways and radical ideas of the past to the innovation, creativity and ambition shaping our town today. Now, we want to imagine what comes next together.
Swindon2029 will give us an opportunity to explore ideas, test decisions and strengthen opportunities across every area of the borough. We’ll explore five challenges, linked to Swindon’s innovative can-do spirit: democratic futures; young people leading change; humans and technology; climate imagination; and collective storytelling and identity.
As well as creating big moments to showcase Swindon in a bold way, we want to enable a whole year of hyperlocal activities in communities across the whole borough.
Now is your opportunity to join the conversation and help shape the bid by sharing your ideas, stories and dreams for Swindon’s future.
Why are we applying?
This is our opportunity to elevate the town’s future with a year of unforgettable events, creativity and celebration, attracting new investment, jobs and visitors.
Every four years, one place is chosen to host a year of unforgettable events, creativity and celebration, attracting major investment, jobs and visitors. This year, the winner will be awarded £10m towards it’s 2029 year of celebration. We’re bidding because Swindon is fuelled by ideas, ambition and collaboration across business, education, culture and heritage. With £1.3m already invested in culture, momentum is building.
Now is our moment to show the UK who we truly are: makers, thinkers and doers. We want everyone to get involved. Let’s make it happen here.
Get involved!
Got an event in your community you’d like us to attend?
Contact hello@swindonculturecollective.org.uk
Whilst our scheduled consultation events have now completed, you can still share your thoughts.
Look out for postcards to share your ideas
You can find #WeDreamInPublic postcards & idea boxes in venues and community hubs, across Swindon.
If you would like postcards to gather feedback from your community or at your event, please contact hello@swindonculturecollective.org.uk
Join the conversation
Follow @swindon2029 on Facebook or Instagram for all the latest news on the bid
Alternatively, share your thoughts, ideas and dreams via our online form
Your questions
“But Swindon’s not a city??”
No, we know, but apparently that’s not how it works! 😉
We’ve compiled a few of our most Frequently Asked Questions, below!
Swindon’s thriving culture!
Swindon’s cultural calendar continues to expand, with major events including Swindon Festival of Literature, Swindon MELA, Swindon Paint Fest, Signal Festival, the Festival of Tomorrow and Shuffle.
The town is also home to nationally-recognised organisations such as Create Studios, Prime Theatre, Swindon Dance and Tangle Theatre, alongside thriving grassroots organisations and a growing independent network of artists, producers and community groups.
In August last year, Swindon Culture Collective CIC, a not-for-profit organisation, launched to increase participation, inclusion and celebrate Swindon’s creative life. It is delivering a two-year programme of cultural activity in the town, part funded by £600,000 from Arts Council England’s National Lottery Place Partnership Fund.
The Council is also continuing work to explore options for delivering a new state-of-the-art town centre entertainment venue to replace the ageing Wyvern Theatre. The project would enable Swindon to host a wider range of performances, including major West End touring productions, large-scale concerts and other significant events.
Swindon’s bid for UK City of Culture aligns with these ambitions, highlighting the important role the creative industries can play in supporting the town’s economic growth. An initial expression of interest, submitted at no additional cost to the Council, will celebrate Swindon’s identity and the people who make it a place of ideas, energy and progress.
The Government is announced Swindon in the longlist in March 2026, with each selected place receiving £60,000 to develop a full bid by 10th August. A shortlist will follow in Autumn 2026, ahead of the final winner being confirmed in Winter 2026.
Click here to find out more about the UK City of Culture
Click here to find out about the announcement of our invitation to Swindon to dream in public!
Benefits for Swindon
Making Swindon even better!
Previous holders of the UK City of Culture title – Derry/Londonderry, Hull, Coventry and Bradford – have demonstrated how the programme can transform a place, driving economic and social benefits, strengthening communities, building local pride and attracting national and international partnerships.
Boost the local cultural offer!
The title is also proven to boost grassroots creativity, widen participation in the arts and bring significant new investment and tourism.
Direct financial investment!
The winning bid will secure up to £10m to deliver a year-long programme of arts, heritage and cultural activity. Other successful places have found that being the title holder encourages other investment, too.
UK City of Culture is a competition run by DCMS, inviting places across the UK to set out their vision for culture-led transformation. It is open to cities, towns, regions and groups of places. First launched in 2009 and now in its fifth iteration, the competition has supported Derry/Londonderry, Hull, Coventry and Bradford to deliver a year of rich cultural activity rooted in their unique identities and drawing on local strengths and stories.
It has supported many others to articulate a vision for their place and consider the place of culture in their plans and aspirations. It is a UK-wide programme, developed in collaboration with the devolved governments in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales and has become a model for cultural place-making.
You can find out more, here.
In the words of Juliet, “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose, by any other word would smell as sweet.”
And, whilst Swindon is officially a town, its population size is too large for us to qualify for UK Town of Culture, and, instead UK City of Culture is the right fund for us!
Great question!
As a longlisted place, the Department of Media and Sport will provide a grant of £60,000 to help Swindon develop the full bid by the deadline on 10th August.
If Swindon is shortlisted (we’d find out in the autumn) we’d get an additional £125,000 to take forward ideas in the bid.
If we win (we’d find out by the end of 2026) Swindon will be awarded £10 Million. We would also seek additional funding and investment.
The 9 longlisted places have been announced, and Swindon is one of them!
The other places are: Blackpool, Inverness-Highland, Ipswich, Middlesbrough, Milton Keynes, Portsmouth, Sheffield, and Wrexham.
We now need to work on a full bid by 10 August 2026.
A shortlist will follow in Autumn 2026, ahead of the final winner being confirmed in Winter 2026.
That will be up to Swindon to decide. As part of the process for writing our full bid we’ll need to work out what we’d plan to do with the money. That’s why we want to gather as many ideas and suggestions as we can, to make sure we’re representing the creativity of the whole town.
The UK City of Culture Expert Advisory Panel plays a key role in the competition. The panel brings a broad and diverse range of sector experience and expertise and will provide critical and objective assessment of bids and make recommendations to the Secretary of State for DCMS at all stages of the competition. The panel will also undertake visits to shortlisted places and act as a critical friend to the winning place.
The UK City of Culture 2029 panel will be led by Sir Phil Redmond CBE, as Chair. It comprises the Deputy Chair (Claire McColgan CBE), representatives for England, Northern Ireland, Scotland, and Wales and up to five other ordinary members.
DCMS ran an open recruitment process to appoint up to nine individuals to join the panel. The deadline for applications was Monday 24 November 2025.
The Expression of Interest we submitted we drew on all of the previous work done by the Swindon Culture Collective network, and some workshops with the cultural sector and some young people in Swindon to refine our ideas.
The job, now that we’ve been longlisted, is to make some plans as to how to get as much input as we can from as many people as we can.
We’ll be sharing ways to do that once we are ready in the next few months, but if you know you want to get involved get in touch!