Anne Hathaway's Cottage awarded £244k grant

A grant of £244,000 "to support a major programme of conservation work" at one of William Shakespeare's family homes has been awarded by The National Lottery Heritage Fund.

Work at Anne Hathaway's Cottage, including essential repair activities, will start shortly at the Grade I listed building and continue until March next year, the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust (SBT) said.

The building in Shottery, Warwickshire, which dates largely from the 15th Century, will stay open, allowing visitors to see work taking place.

The project forms part of the trust's wider multi-year programme of planned conservation across the Shakespeare family homes.

The initiative would create new opportunities for apprenticeships, training and volunteering, said SBT, which cares for Shakespeare heritage sites including the family home of Anne Hathaway, the playwright's wife-to-be.

SBT head of estates Mark Ratcliffe said it was "one of the most important surviving historic homes associated with Shakespeare and his family".

He added the money would "allow us to undertake essential conservation work to protect the building for generations to come".

The National Lottery Heritage Fund's director for the Midlands, Liz Bates, said the charity was pleased to support SBT with the project, which would "help safeguard the building while also providing opportunities for people to engage with traditional conservation skills".

SBT said it was also grateful to charity The Michael Bishop Foundation for supporting work at the cottage as part of a wider three-year programme of funding for essential conservation works across its sites.

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