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Heritage Open Days

What is Heritage Open Days?

Heritage Open Days is England’s largest community-led heritage festival. It has been running since 1994. Every year thousands of volunteers and organisations host free events celebrating and sharing local heritage sites and stories across the country during 10 days in September. The festival is coordinated by a small national team, and promoted on the Heritage Open Days website.

Our district always puts on a great show for Heritage Open Days, and Our Stories Our Heritage is helping even more groups to get involved. The following guidance is aimed at groups who are interested in taking part in the festival for the first time, as well as groups that regularly host Heritage Open Days events.

How can we get involved?

If you would like to get involved, the national Heritage Open Days website has lots of useful information for event organisers, including newcomers to the festival (weblink: How to get involved). You don’t need to have a building or historical site to open. Heritage Open Days events can be as creative as you want them to be. From guided history walks and talks, to podcasts, performances and film showings, your event just needs to be free to access and arranged specially for the festival, during the specified dates. Please contact the Heritage Development Manager at heritage@wakefield.gov.uk if you would like to discuss your ideas.

Heritage Open Days 2025

During Heritage Open Days 2025, over 2,500 organisers and 44,200 volunteers ran 5,879 events across the country, attracting over one million visits. Around one-quarter of visitors had not visited a heritage site/event in the past year while 83% of festival-goers said their visit made them more proud of their local area.

Here in Wakefield district, we played our part with a fantastic programme that opened doors - literally and figuratively - to our rich and diverse heritage. Communities across the district came together to celebrate the stories, places, and traditions that make our district unique. We saw over 130 events drawing an amazing 13,300+ visitors.

From photography exhibitions and historic school and church tours to behind-the-scenes glimpses of archives and walks along historic walls. Visitors explored everything from industrial and farming heritage to architecture, schools, sculptures, Roman history, and even local myths and legends.

Watch this short film to explore the incredible community-led activities that made an impact across our district for Heritage Open Days 2025:

Heritage Open Days 2026

Heritage Open Days took place again between 11–20 September 2026. Look out for future updates on the impact of this year's events!

Resources and guidance

Heritage Open Days information sessions have previously been delivered to the Wakefield District Heritage Network. The following presentations and guidance documents from these sessions may be helpful for any groups wanting to run Heritage Open Days events in the district: