Conservation Management Plan

At the beginning of 2020, the Friends of Tower Hamlets Cemetery Park were awarded a National Lottery Heritage Fund grant to create our first Conservation Management Plan. This first phase of funding enabled us to expand our offer of heritage activities and training, and engage more people in our amazing history as well as work towards better conserving both our natural and cultural heritage.

The project was also supported by The Pilgrim Trust who awarded us additional funds to help pay for surveys and site studies that helped us to better understand our history and our potential for the future. It was also supported by the Garfield Weston Foundation.

The CMP was completed in late 2022. The extensive plan is available here:

THCP Conservation Plan Part 1
THCP Conservation Plan Part 2

Some of the work we did on surveys is also available here: CMP consultations report for publication

CMP Impact

As a result of this work so far, we are better able to:

Describe our heritage and our history
Understand why the Cemetery Park matters and to whom
Understand what is happening to our heritage and what most needs preserving
Understand what the key issues are that will affect the Cemetery Park over the coming years
Plan conservation and restoration works for the future
Improve public access
Plan activities and interpretation that engage the whole community

Work to Date

We have an extensive schedule of works as part of the Conservation Management Plan, and to complete the entire programme of works will require extensive fundraising and project management.

So far we have:

Invited over 2,000 visitors to try out heritage activities and share thoughts on how we can bring heritage to life within the cemetery park.
Improved the Outdoor Classroom / Forest School area, replacing seating and a dead hedge to provide insulation and better mark out the area
Built a new green waste area, relocating this to the ‘Fern Glade’ area. No headstones remain in this space after the clearance works of the Greater London Council in the 1960-80s.
Removed damaged fencing around ‘Sanctuary Woods’, opening up access to the space and improving the potential to manage monuments in this area.
Developed the Cemetery Park Lodge, a formerly disused space, as the improved administrative offices for the Friends of Tower Hamlets Cemetery Park. This investment will be a key part of our efforts to build and scale capacity alongside the Soanes Field Centre, with both serving as bases from which to welcome small and large groups of visitors into the Cemetery Park. Through this we will build on our existing community and volunteer programmes of events, including skills workshops, talks, tours, lectures and more.

Works to Come

Throughout the coming years we will be working on restoring historic pathways and routes around the cemetery park, improving interpretation and signage throughout the site, refining our events and activities offerings, and refreshing our hands-on heritage volunteer programmes.

For further information please contact our heritage officer at heritage@fothcp.org.

My Shopping Cart