About this Project
In May 2025, we recruited a team of young people to become Heritage Producers, as part of an innovative project to represent the borough of Rotherham in all its diversity.
The project, which has been funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund, will see a Heritage Producer based in each of the 25 wards of the Rotherham borough, charged with helping the people who live, study and work there tell their own stories for years to come.
Project Manager Kathryn Reaney said, “This is such an exciting chance for young people to make a real difference to the way the times they are living through are remembered. Our Heritage Producers are bursting with energy and ideas and I can’t wait to see what they will come up with!”
Our Heritage Producers will be collecting oral histories: the authentic voices, stories, and experiences from a particular point in time of the people who have lived through this moment. With the consent of the participants, these stories will be housed in the Rotherham Archives and will offer a chance to hear the voices of the past long into the future. They are the stories of the people, showing a slice of real life, the life behind the headlines, for years to come.
Our Heritage Producers have also been tasked with producing creative projects – which could be anything from community meals to documentary-making, podcast creation to print-making – with the local community to recognise and reflect their lives.
Our Heritage Producers will be supported in their wards by Community Host Organisations, who will point them in the direction of the people, places and issues that matter locally, so they can work effectively in those communities.
And finally, some of this work will help shape a spectacular finale event in early 2026, which will mark the end of the Children’s Capital of Culture Festival Year and look ahead to what’s next!
Our Heritage Producers Want to Hear From You!
Children’s Capital of Culture’s team of Heritage Producers want to hear from you so they can record your stories to be kept in the borough’s archives.
There’s a Heritage Producer for each ward in the borough and their job is to find people with stories to tell about their everyday lives: the ordinary and the sometimes extraordinary!
We hope these stories will be held in the Rotherham Archives for generations to come and provide historians and researchers with rich information about how our lives were lived in this festival year.
If you would like to take part, contact our Project manager, Kathryn, using our Contact Us form. Kathryn will pass your details on to the Heritage Producer for your area. You can then meet them at their community venue and they’ll record your tales.
Everybody has a story to tell, so let’s hear yours!
Join us for Children's Capital of Culture 2025!
Together, we will make Rotherham a place that young people are proud to call home.
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