We’re a charity and we need you
Heritage and material culture is relevant to all of us – whether you’re visiting an exhibition at an art gallery, turning the pages of an old family photo album or wondering what to do about the historic wallpaper you’ve just discovered in your new house.
Your support is essential if we are to ensure the survival of our material culture, and to raise the profile of the highly specialist skills and professional standards of the UK’s conservators.
Making a gift in your will
Help us to champion cultural heritage and secure the future of the conservation profession by leaving a gift to Icon in your will
Become a trustee
Icon’s trustees are responsible for shaping our vision and mission
Donate to Icon today
Help us protect and preserve heritage for future generations
Icon is always seeking new partnerships and is proud to collaborate with a variety of other cultural heritage organisations. We are also grateful to the many organisations that support us and our work.
Our Partners
Icon collaborates with others in the arts, cultural heritage and commercial sectors to deliver projects that will benefit the public
Heritage Compass
Icon is proud to be taking part in the Heritage Compass programme. Launched by Cause4 in 2020, Heritage Compass is a new Business Support Programme funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund. This new programme has been designed to grow resilience and invigorate the heritage sector across England and is being delivered by Cause4 working in collaboration with consortium partners Creative United and the Arts Marketing Association.
Fit for the Future
Icon is a member of Fit for the Future, an environmental sustainability network with over 100 charities, heritage organisations, cultural venues, public sector bodies and more in its membership. We facilitate knowledge-sharing and collaboration across organisations and sectors so that they can achieve the rapid and far-reaching changes needed to decarbonise, adapt to climate change and drive positive environmental impacts.
Climate Heritage Network
Despite profound connections between climate change and culture, today there are thousands of arts, culture and heritage actors and advocates whose talents have not yet been mobilized on climate change issues, including administrators, anthropologists, archaeologists, architects, artists, conservators, curators, engineers, historians, librarians, musicians, urban planners, site managers, as well as scientists, researchers, teachers and scholars and carriers of indigenous knowledge and local wisdom whose talents have not yet been mobilized on climate change issues. This is so even in jurisdictions that have made ambitious climate action pledges via networks like the Under 2 Coalition. The Climate Heritage Network aims to flip that paradigm.
National Heritage Science Forum
Icon is a founding member of the National Heritage Science Forum (NHSF). NHSF is a membership organisation and registered charity committed to demonstrating the public benefit of heritage science, increasing public engagement with it and support for it. NHSF brings together the producers and users of heritage science to improve collaboration, help practitioners make better use of research, and demonstrate the public benefit of heritage science.
Professional Associations Research Network
Icon is a member of the Professional Associations Research Network (PARN). PARN is a not-for-profit membership organisation for professional bodies, offering expertise, experience and perspective on key issues in the sector through research, bespoke services, networking, events and training. As a member of PARN, Icon is: committed to good practice; kept up to date on current research; part of a network of professional bodies that learn from and share with each other.
The Heritage Alliance
Icon is an active member of The Heritage Alliance. The Heritage Alliance unites over 150 independent heritage organisations in England as a powerful, effective and independent advocate for heritage. As England’s biggest coalition of heritage interests The Heritage Alliance brings together large heritage organisations and a range of more specialist bodies representing visitors, owners, volunteers, professional practitioners, funders and educationalists.
Our Supporters
OUR FUNDERS
The redevelopment of the Conservation Register has been generously funded by The Pilgrim Trust and the Anna Plowden Trust.
OUR SUPPORTERS
The Conservation Register provides a reliable way for members of the public and other clients to easily identify and contact an accredited professional to help them care for the objects they cherish. This helps to ensure that cultural heritage in private ownership is conserved to appropriate standards so that the objects and collections can be enjoyed by future generations. Maintaining the Conservation Register ensures that Icon can fulfil its vision for cultural heritage to be valued and accessible and for its future to be enhanced and safeguarded by excellence in conservation.
The following organisations support the principle of the Conservation Register and have offered their endorsement because they share Icon’s commitment to professional accreditation and high standards of conservation.
- English Heritage
- Historic Houses
- Landmark Trust
- National Trust
- SPAB
Icon also has very good relationships with the grant-making trusts that value professional accreditation highly. The Pilgrim Trust is a key supporter, which is why they provided funding for the redevelopment of the Conservation Register.
Several other organisations, including AIM, the Idlewild Trust, the National Manuscripts Conservation Trust and Art Fund, also stipulate that conservators working on funded projects should hold ACR status.
Whilst other funders, such as the National Lottery Heritage Fund, do not require conservators to be accredited, we do know that making a commitment to commissioning ACRs helps to strengthen an applicant’s bid because it helps demonstrate that risks to cultural heritage are being reduced.