Heritage Open Days and Kingston Society’s Role in Celebrating Local History

Heritage Open Days

Heritage Open Days (HODs) is England’s largest festival of history and culture, offering free access to heritage sites and events every September. Initially managed by English Heritage (EH), it is now managed by the National Trust. HODs serve as a platform for showcasing hidden places, unique experiences, and celebrating local architecture and history.

Royal Borough of Kingston (RBK), has incorporated Heritage Open Days (HODs) into its broader Kingston Heritage Festival, which is organised by Kingston Heritage Services. The festival includes events like Open House London Currently, while RBK coordinates some events, most are managed by community groups like ours, with RBK providing publicity support. You can find more information about the council’s HODs here.

Kingston Society’s Historical Contributions

The Kingston Society has a proud history of contributing to Heritage Open Days. From 2001 to 2023 we also managed public access to the Coombe Conduit on behalf of EH . Unfortunately we could no longer continue this because our keyholder retired and EH wanted to impose more onerous conditions. However, we believe HODs remains a vital opportunity to connect the community with Kingston’s rich heritage.

If you’re passionate about preserving Kingston’s heritage and engaging the public, we need you to join us in continuing this vital work! You might coordinate events, lead tours, or support promotional initiatives like Open House London, all in line with our mission to celebrate local history and architecture.

Together we can keep Kingston’s architectural and cultural treasures accessible to all. JOIN US TODAY!

For more information contact us here

Heritage Open Days – previous years

With over 1500 visitors over the four days, the range of activities and events has been quite diverse, for example:

  • An Inter Faith Walk visiting 5 different types of places of worship, and the Trycyclingathon on the same day.
  • Canbury Photographic Studio which was a winner of a Townscape award
  • The new Kingston Quaker Centre;
  • County Hall and Kingston Working Men’s Club.

There have been a number of exhibitions such as the very popular Kingston Aviation in the BalletBoyz Dance studio or YMCA, Warren House Tales at Warren House, and town centre redevelopment proposals at the Old Post Office as well as the Ancient Market Place Exhibition. There have also been activities for children in some venues such as the Dorich House Museum.

There have been plenty of old favourites such as All Saints Parish Church, Coombe and Ivy Conduit Houses, Frederick Paine Undertakers, Cleaves Almshouses and many others. The old bridge remains and Undercroft in the basement of John Lewis has been very popular in previous years, with over 400 visitors in 2013, but sadly it was closed in 2017 due to flooding from a burst pipe.