UNIVERSITY OF BATH DEPARTMENT OF ARCHITECTURE AND CIVIL ENGINEERING
Master of Science in the Conservation of Historic Buildings
Session 2009- 10
BUILDING PRESERVATION TRUSTS
INTRODUCTION
Although conservation legislation in the UK has been effective in controlling demolition of historic
buildings or the worst excesses of mutilation, it has been less effective in promoting and securing
positive conservation, particularly where owners are unwilling to co-operate. Local authorities
are encouraged to prepare lists of "Buildings at Risk" and to use Urgent Works and Repairs
Notices but most do not have the resources to take direct action to secure the long-term future of
such buildings. It has therefore been largely left to private owners and others to take the
initiative. In recent years historic buildings and buildings in conservation areas have been seen
as desirable places in which to live and substantial private investment has gone into the
conservation of the built fabric. This is relatively easy where a building has an obvious future or
easily identifiable end use, (usually residential) but is a problem in relation to buildings where the
cost of repair exceeds restored value or the future use of the building or area is uncertain.
From time to time you will come across historic buildings in desperate need of repair and it is
easy to ask 'what are the authorities going to do about it'? Long before Repairs Notice and
Urgent Works procedures became available the only option to save a threatened building was for
those concerned to become directly involved. For some the challenge of rescuing an historic
building is so compelling that they will give up their own time and money in order to 'save the
building'. One way to do this is to set up a Building Preservation Trust.
The earliest Building Preservation Trusts pre-date conservation legislation. The Cambridge
Preservation Society was formed in 1929, followed by the Bath Preservation Society 1934. Then
comes the Plymouth Barbican Association Ltd 1957 and the Kings Lynn Preservation Trust 1959,
with a further eight trusts added in the 1960's. By the end of 1979 there were 39 in existence,
which by the end of 1989 had grown to 92, by 1998 to 169 and today around 260. In 2003 the
BBC "Restoration" programme gave considerable air-time to the plight of 30 derelict historic
buildings across the UK, 21 of which were the focus for local Trust activity. The exercise was
repeated in 2004 and 2006 bringing information on other threatened buildings to the attention of
the viewing public.
BACKGROUND
The impetus for the significant growth in BPTs in the 1970's (and subsequently) was a 1969
survey of the work of the 21 trusts then in existence. The study was initiated by the Civic Trust
with financial support from the then Ministry of Housing and Local Government and its purpose
was:

to examine the success and defects of existing trusts and revolving funds in Britain and,
where appropriate, abroad:
 to analyse the basic criteria for success – the order of capital required, the optimum
area/population base and the advantages and disadvantages of different forms of
constitution:
 to evaluate the basic validity of the concept as one of potentially wider application than at the
moment.
The study group was asked to consider compiling a simple handbook of advice for those willing
to start trusts to include a model form of constitution, Articles of Association etc.
The group was also asked to make proposals for action at national level, for example for a
central organisation.
BU BPTs Colin Johns notes 2010 R8
1
The study was to cover Great Britain as a whole. Special mention was made in the report of the
National Trust for Scotland, Little Houses Improvement Scheme and the rehabilitation of Abbey
Street Faversham as interesting examples of the use of modest capital to purchase buildings,
rehabilitate and sell using the proceeds to move on to the next project. All County Planning
Officers were contacted and discussions held with trusts, Government Departments and national
preservation societies. The report also included reference to the (then new) requirement (1967)
for the enhancement of Conservation Areas.
Amongst the conclusions and recommendations of the Civic Trust report (1971) were
suggestions



to set up a supporting organisation to provide for an exchange of information etc.
to create a National Buildings Conservation Fund with a target of £1 million. Loans from the
Fund to be made available to local Trusts.
that action to establish the NBCF be taken by central Government.
Positive conservation activity in Scotland had started in the 1930's where an interwar campaign
for new municipal housing linked to the clearance of slum housing under the 1930s Housing Acts
had put at risk the small traditional burgh houses. A successful initiative by the then newly
formed National Trust for Scotland secured a way of safeguarding the future of the country's
urban domestic architecture where the Trust, working hand-in-hand with the local authorities,
was able to purchase and restore many historic buildings and make them available at low rents.
Work undertaken in Culross from 1932 and Dunkeld from 1953 were two of the most significant
such projects.
From this came the 1957 idea for a revolving fund utilising the available finance to rescue many
more buildings than could be saved by long term ownership. In 1959 the Trust allocated £10,000
from its general funds for this purpose and the Little Houses scheme was launched. Further
support came by way of a £10,000 grant from the Pilgrim Trust with the local authorities providing
full improvement grants. By 1971 the Trust had succeeded in rescuing 53 buildings in the Fife
villages. The scheme attracted much interest and was frequently cited as an example for others
to follow.
EUROPEAN ARCHITECTURAL HERITAGE YEAR
In May 1972 the Council of Europe's Committee of Ministers and defined the objectives of EAHY
as follows:
 to awaken the interests of the European peoples in their common architectural heritage
 to protect and enhance buildings and areas of architectural interest
 to conserve the character of old towns and villages
 to assure for ancient buildings a living role in contemporary society
The Civic Trust was appointed as the UK Secretariat to organise a programme of activity for the
UK. One of the principal aims of the UK campaign was to seek the establishment of a National
Architectural Heritage Fund to provide loan capital to local preservation trusts. The idea was
given a major boost when the Secretary of State for the Environment (Michael Hestletine)
promised to match any money raised pound-for-pound (up to a maximum of £500,000), which it
was hoped would provide the Fund with starting capital of at least £1 million.
The other notable conservation event in 1975 was the founding of SAVE Britain's Heritage.
SAVE, as well as campaigning vigorously for the protection and reuse of historic buildings, set
out to show that almost any building could be rescued given sufficient determination and
imagination. SAVE would later go on to take up the challenge of historic building repair and
argue the economic case for conservation.
BU BPTs Colin Johns notes 2010 R8
2
THE ARCHITECTURAL HERITAGE FUND
The AHF is an independent charity originally founded in 1976 to support revolving fund building
preservation trusts. This is its primary objective but it is also able to help charities carrying out
projects on single buildings which will remain in community use. The purpose of the AHF is to
give preservation trusts and other charities access to working capital for projects to rescue and
rehabilitate historic buildings. It makes low interest loans to organisations with charitable status
for projects involving a change of ownership and/or use of historic buildings in need of repair and
rehabilitation. Buildings must be listed, scheduled and/or be in a conservation area.
The AHF can offer Options Appraisals Grants to assist in the assessment of potential future uses
of a building. It can also offer grants to cover project administration, organisation and
development. From its initial £1 million target in 1975, the AHF now has total resources in
excess of £13 million. The AHF Annual Review includes an illustrated selection of BPT projects
under preparation or completed during the year.
The AHF report 1976 - 1996 The First Twenty Years illustrated that 330 low-interest loans
amounting to over £22.5 million had been contracted helping to fund a remarkable range of
projects in every part of the UK. Work since 1996 has been given substantial impetus by input
from the National Lottery and particularly from the Heritage Lottery Fund.
The Architectural Heritage Fund 2008-09 Annual Review shows 167 Trusts on its Register made
up of England 114, N. Ireland 11, Scotland 20, Wales 15 and National 7
.
The AHF Register covers the whole of the UK and to qualify for entry an organisation must:
 have charitable status
 be established solely or principally in order to preserve historic buildings for the benefit of the
community
 be constituted so that money released from one project can be applied to another
 intend to undertake a programme of preservation projects
In addition to the revolving fund trusts there are other trusts established in order to rescue and
manage specific buildings, usually for community or similar use. These single building trusts do
not qualify for inclusion on the AHF’s Register but can benefit from all its grants and loans.
Contact
AHF 9th Floor Alhambra House 27-31 Charing Cross Road London WC2H 0AU
 0207 925 0199 e-mail ahf@ahfund.org.uk
Website: www.ahfund.org.uk
REVOLVING FUND AND SINGLE PROJECT BPTs
There are two principal types of BPTs, those formed to do more than one project, on the
revolving fund basis, and those formed to save a particular building(s) or site. In the latter case
there are several examples of Trusts set up to save and manage historic property, the most well
known being the Landmark Trust and the Vivat Trust, both of which run successful holiday letting
businesses.
Trusts vary in size, from a small group of like-minded people getting together to rescue a
threatened building or buildings in a single town, to a County or District-wide organisation
established at the initiative of the local authority. There are also a number of UK wide Trusts.
THE LEGAL FRAMEWORK
Revolving fund and single project BPTs are usually voluntary organisations (although some now
have paid employees) but their business involves buying, repairing and selling or managing
property for which it is necessary to mobilise large amounts of money. In order to protect those
who take decisions from being personally responsible, the organisation needs a separate legal
existence.
BU BPTs Colin Johns notes 2010 R8
3
An appropriate way of giving an organisation this identity is incorporation as a Company Limited
by Guarantee. The principal advantage of this is that the BPT acquires a distinct legal identity
and, provided due care is exercised in its administration, the liability of individual members is
limited. An incorporated BPT will have clearly defined powers that facilitate its business
operations. Charitable status is usually advisable as it can give access to grants not available to
non-charities.
The first requirement when setting up a revolving fund BPT is to decide what the Trust wants to
do, in other words to define its objects. To achieve charitable status, all of the BPT's objects
must be charitable and comply with Charity Law. To assist in the formation of a charity a
comprehensive range of free booklets is available from the Charity Commission. The essential
ingredients for charitable status are "the preservation of buildings of architectural or historic
interest for the benefit of the people of a particular town or county." The Trust must also define
its geographical limit of operations.
The Articles of Association of a Trust set out the terms of reference of the Governing Body.
Governors or trustees are directors of the company and must comply with the requirements of
the Companies Act. The AHF produces an information pack, including a 'standard governing
document' on the setting up a Trust.
FINDING A PROJECT
For Trusts set up to rescue a specific building this will not be a problem but for revolving funds
with a number of years activity finding a project is not always straightforward. The logical place
to start is the buildings at risk lists produced by local authorities and English Heritage. These will
often identify buildings for which no commercially economic use can be found and where the
ability of Trusts to attract grants or low interest loans will make a difference.
Some Trusts work in co-operation with their local authority and provide an essential back-up in
the use of Repairs Notices. In such cases the use of back-to-back agreements allow the local
authority to acquire the property and immediately pass it to the Trust for renovation and resale. It
may be appropriate for the local authority to offer a form of guarantee, and for the use of the
building to be in line with other objectives of the authority, for example economic development or
social housing. Although much less common, there are examples of properties being given or
left to a Trust by supporters or benefactors.
These days finding a project will be influenced by the policy of the funding agencies and the
rescue of a building for its own sake is less likely to be possible. Some argue that Trusts are well
placed to repair buildings as 'an example to others' but funding such exercises is difficult under
the present regimes.
FUNDING
In the early days of Trust activity grant aid was provided by the Ministry of Housing and Local
Government, later the Historic Buildings Council, and since 1985 English Heritage. Other
charitable trusts, especially the Pilgrim Trust, provided help, as did many local authorities.
With the significant reduction in availability of Government funding via English Heritage, the
plethora of individual funding initiatives and the advent of the National Lottery and ENTRUST, the
situation is now much more complicated. Fundraising has become a highly complex issue and
'Funds for Historic Buildings in England and Wales – A Directory of Sources' – published by the
Architectural Heritage Fund, is a vital source of information (frequently updated and accessible at
www.ffhb.org.uk).
BU BPTs Colin Johns notes 2010 R8
4
COST PLANNING
It is essential for trusts, and their professional advisers, to understand the complete development
process and to take into account all known, or likely, financial implications of a project at the very
early stages. It is all to easy to look at a property, assess the cost of repair and the likely value
on completion but overlook essential parts of the financial picture. The budget for a Trust project
needs to cover:
An initial Options Appraisal or Feasibility Study
Purchase price
Legal fees (acquisition)
Architect's fees
Quantity Surveyor's fees
Structural Engineer's fees
CDM co-ordinator fees
(all fees + expenses)
Insurance (buildings and public liability)
Building costs (repairs and alterations + all external works)
Planning and Building Regulation fees
Legal fees (disposal)
Estate Agent's fees
VAT where appropriate (and where non-recoverable)
BPT overheads and expenses
The budget must also allow for interest charged on any loans required or interest lost on working
capital. Expenses for the Trust and a contingency should also be included.
Many funding organisations will nowadays only offer grants to cover the conservation deficit of a
project, in other words the difference between the total cost and the value on completion. Where
the scheme is expected to break even, or possibly make a surplus, there is unlikely to be any
outside funding. It will often be insufficient for Trusts to approach a single funding agency and it
is now more likely that a funding package will need to be negotiated. This may involve English
Heritage, the Heritage Lottery Fund (or another lottery funder), the local authority, regional
agency and other charitable trusts. It may also involve access to economic development money
or Government regeneration initiatives. In certain areas of the country European funding is a
possibility. Specific funding schemes such as the joint EH / HLF Townscape Heritage Initiatives
are another option in specified areas.
Funding agencies have their own agendas and grant applications need to be targeted
accordingly. Community benefit is important to HLF and to Entrust whereas English Heritage will
usually take more note of the architectural and historic quality of the building. EH grants are
normally restricted to grade I and II* buildings and availability is limited. In recent years the
Government funding for English Heritage has declined in real terms thus reducing the amount of
grant money available and this has had an especially detrimental effect on the rescue of
buildings on the EH at risk list that do not qualify for other grants.
For a project to proceed it will be insufficient simply to add up the offers of funding and a
cashflow forecast will be needed. For more complex projects Trusts will need to produce
Business Plans which will be vital if loans are to be negotiated with commercial banks or similar
organisations.
OPTIONS APPRAISALS (sometimes referred to as Feasibility Studies)
The purpose of an Options Appraisal is to establish whether or not a Trust can achieve its
objectives (of saving the building) within acceptable costs and appropriate timescales. The study
is a preliminary exercise undertaken to enable the trust to decide whether it is worth spending
more time and money to take the project forward.
BU BPTs Colin Johns notes 2010 R8
5
There will be a significant difference between a project for the rescue of a Grade I or II* building
than with a building in a conservation area where the primary consideration may well be
economic regeneration.
An Options Appraisal is not intended to be the vehicle for producing elaborately drawn and
detailed schemes but is essentially a tool for identifying the risks and evaluating the likely
outcome of a project. The professionals involved need to be fully experienced in the type of work
being undertaken and should understand the special status of the Trust.
Critical to the Options Appraisal is an initial viability assessment. This should include an analysis
of the most appropriate use for the building and the likely market within the specific area. Very
few Trusts will be in a position to acquire a property prior to the completion of a Options
Appraisal and to do so may well involve an unacceptable element of risk.
It is sometimes suggested that a scheme can be made to work in financial terms by the
introduction of 'enabling development'. This course of action needs to be treated with great care
if the historic integrity of a site is not to be compromised or the end value of the original buildings
as restored much reduced.
UK ASSOCIATION OF PRESERVATION TRUSTS
In the 1971 Civic Trust Report mention was made of the desirability of creating a supporting
organisation to provide for an exchange of information between BPTs. The idea was revived at
the AHF Second Annual Conference in 1988 leading to the formation of the UK Association of
Preservation Trusts in 1989.
APT is an independent charity formed "to encourage and assist BPTs, both individually and
collectively, to expand their capacity to preserve the built heritage." It arranges conferences and
seminars and has produced a series of Guidance Notes for Trusts. Membership of APT is open
to any charitable organisation in the UK whose primary object includes the preservation of
historic buildings. The members of APT are divided between nine Area Committees, six in
England, and one each in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. APT is based at The
Architectural Heritage Fund offices in London and current membership is now over 250.
Contact
UK APT Dr James Moir Director
9th Floor Alhambra House 27-31 Charing Cross Road London WC2H 0AU
 0207 930 1629 e-mail apt@ahfund.org.uk
Website: www.ukapt.org.uk
CONSERVATION LED REGENERATION
In recent years there has been a substantial move away from conservation projects for their own
sake and towards projects that make a contribution to the regeneration of an area by improving
the environment and providing renovated buildings for residential or employment use. The
potential for such activity is recognised in the 2000 report of the heritage review - Power of Place
and in the December 2001 Government response The Historic Environment – A Force for Our
Future. The arguments in favour are that conservation led regeneration can be successful
because places matter to people and that the retention of buildings can mean also the retention
and improvement of communities. It seems likely that in future a number of Building
Preservation Trusts will focus their attention on the regeneration potential, particularly where this
can unlock funds not available previously. Links with the Development Trusts Association are
also likely to increase.
There are still those who argue that the retention of historic buildings is an impediment to
progress and that more needs to be done to improve living standards by demolition and
redevelopment. Equally there remain strong arguments in favour of creative reuse. The Role of
Historic Buildings in Urban Regeneration was the subject of an ODPM House of Commons
Select Committee Report (session 2003-04).
BU BPTs Colin Johns notes 2010 R8
6
The Committee concluded that - the historic environment has an important part to play in
regeneration schemes helping to create vibrant interesting areas, boosting local economies and
restoring local confidence. When historic buildings including churches are no longer needed for
their original use they are capable of conversion for a wide range of other purposes.
The Committee also gave support to the work of Building Preservation Trusts recognising - the
valuable role they play in brining back into use neglected buildings which the private sector is not
interested in. And so the debate continues.
LOOKING AHEAD
A review of BPT activity across the United Kingdom over the last 25 years reveals a wide range
of projects delivering significant benefits to communities and the heritage, and importantly to
economic activity. Many of these projects emerge from a determination amongst individuals or
small groups of people to take direct action. Protest is one option but setting up a trust is much
more creative and is greatly assisted these days by the Heritage Lottery Fund.
The success of the Trust movement comes from responding to changes in society and seeing
how heritage-led projects can turn an historic building problem into an asset. Also by sharing
knowledge and expertise across the sector Trusts can find ways to exploit the opportunities
offered and adjust their methods of working to suit changing social and economic circumstances.
Over the years Trust have evolved to respond to the needs and aspirations of today and there is
no reason why this cannot continue.
USEFUL REFERENCES
How to Rescue a Ruin – by setting up a Local Buildings Preservation Trust –
Hilary Weir for the Architectural Heritage Fund, Second Edition, 1997
Analysis and recording for the conservation and control of works to historic buildings –
Association of Local Government Archaeological Officers, 1997
Stopping the Rot – A step by step guide to serving Urgent Works and Repairs Notices, EH 1998
Catalytic Conversion – Revive Historic Buildings to Regenerate Communities, SAVE & others, 1998
Rescued or Ruined? – Dealing with Enabling Development, The Garden History Society & others, 1999
Informed Conservation – Understanding Historic Buildings and their landscapes for conservation - English
Heritage 2001
Enabling Development and the Conservation of Heritage Assets –
Policy Statement and Practical Guide to Assessment, English Heritage, June 2001 revised 2007
Options Appraisals Grants – A Guide for Buildings Preservation Trusts, AHF,
Guidance Notes for Building Preservation Trusts – UK Association of Preservation Trusts, 2006 (revised
edition)
Valuing our Heritage - investing in our future: Our Strategic Plan 2008-2013
Heritage Lottery Fund, 2008
Thinking about buying land and buildings
Heritage Lottery Fund, 2008 (+ other notes in this thinking about series)
Constructive Conservation in Practice - English Heritage 2008
Funds for Historic Buildings in England and Wales – A Directory of Sources, AHF - ffhb.org.uk
and the APT website apt.org.uk
March 2010
BU BPTs Colin Johns notes 2010 R8
7