The Cathedrals' Workshop Fellowship has received £500,000 from the Hamish Ogston Foundation as part of an ongoing partnership programme that began in 2022 and will continue until 2025. Throughout this period £2.3m of funds will be made available to secure the future of cathedrals and the people who care for them. 

This latest grant will be used to fund students as they undertake CWF’s comprehensive training programme, the Hamish Ogston Foundation Craft Training Programme. As part of this, five stonemasonry students will be entered onto Improver Level 3, which will allow them to move onto the CWF’s Foundation degree course in 2025, as well as enabling the recruitment of an additional eleven Level 2 students in both joinery and stonemasonry. Funding will also ensure that six developing and recently qualified stonemasonry students will be able to remain at their home cathedrals and continue to develop their skills.

Since its establishment in 2019, the Hamish Ogston Foundation has pledged nearly £44m towards heritage skills training and is the largest single private donor to heritage skills in the UK.

Frances Cambrook, Executive Director at the CWF, said: “We are enormously grateful to the Hamish Ogston Foundation for this generous grant. There is no doubt that the last few years have been exceptionally challenging due to the lasting impact of the pandemic and the subsequent cost of living crisis, but the support of the Hamish Ogston Foundation has enabled us to continue to deliver a wide-ranging education of the highest possible standard. The results achieved by this year’s cohort are testament to that, and we are proud of each and every student for all that they have achieved. We are excited to enter into this new phase of the project with The Hamish Ogston Foundation, which is vital to ensure the sustainability of the heritage craft skills needed to care for the buildings that we love.”