As an Independent Research Organisation, we are committed to delivering innovative research that supports all aspects of the Trust’s mission: from restoring nature, ending unequal access and inspiring millions, to looking after the many places and collections in our care.
Part of how we do this is through strategic research partnerships with universities. Each of the following partnerships helps deliver high quality collaborative research that makes a real difference to how we protect and share the places we look after.
Launched in 2018, this interdisciplinary partnership supports research into the histories of our places, supporting how we curate and share the stories, sites and collections in our care.
Oxford academics and Trust curators work closely to co-develop innovative research projects, knowledge exchange and engagement activities across a range of shared themes such as histories of childhood, life writing, early photography and the evolving role of the historic house today.
Our projects have spanned the Trust’s unique holdings across England, Wales and Northern Ireland; from modern art and historic textiles, to country house libraries and literary landscapes.
The partnership also supports placements for students to work with properties to help address gaps in knowledge and support the groundwork for new collaborative research.
Since 2021 this strategic partnership has helped to shape national debates on climate resilience, land use and heritage adaptation. We’ve joined forces to deliver an ambitious aim: to shape landscapes where people and nature thrive.
As the world faces rapid environmental change, our combined teams are working at pace to transform research into real-world change for our natural and cultural environments.
The partnership focuses on three main strands:
Together we’ve powered programmes to influence policy, advance science and inspire public engagement, and have jointly secured over £28 million in external funding to drive research. They include the RENEW Biodiversity Programme, funded by the National Environment Research Council, which is working to reshape understanding and action on biodiversity renewal.
This strategic partnership is working to support a sustainable, resilient and inclusive cultural heritage sector through innovative and interdisciplinary heritage science research.
Formalised in 2021, this partnership has made possible a range of secondments, policy placements and projects on topics ranging from evaluating how participatory archaeology supports volunteer wellbeing, to tracking and reducing the carbon footprint of construction projects and lighting our places in ways that protect objects whilst also supporting the needs of our visitors.
We’ve been working in partnership with the GW4 Alliance, which is made up of the universities of Cardiff, Bristol, Bath and Exeter, since 2019. Our joint activities have secured over £1.7 million in research funding.
Successful National Trust-GW4 projects so far include work to illuminate stories of colonialism and enslavement at sites including Snowshill Manor and Garden and Penrhyn Castle; research into place attachment, particularly among young people; and explorations of technology including AI to enhance storytelling in historic spaces.
Since 2017 we’ve collaborated on projects worth over £11 million to conserve nature, promote heritage and engage communities across the North: from preserving and monitoring Hadrian's Wall and Sycamore Gap, to exploring the creative potential of contemporary art and heritage. Our work together has a strong core focus on improving engagement and access to heritage, beauty and nature – for people of all ages.
In 2022 we launched our partnership with the British Library to investigate the many links between our collections, properties and histories. Our joint research includes fellowships enabling PhD students to research topics ranging from authors’ houses to gardening manuals; and from Arabic language manuscripts to the social world of Jane Austen’s Bath.
In 2023 the National Trust also launched our Research Repository on the British Library’s Shared Repository Service, making it easier for people to access scholarly outputs from across our research collaborations.
We're an Independent Research Organisation recognised by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI). Our research takes place in many forms – from the PhDs we sponsor and practical testing of new conservation techniques to the hundreds of research projects we collaborate in or host at places in our care each year.
Learn more about our research – from the PhDs we sponsor and practical testing of conservation techniques to the hundreds of projects we collaborate in or host each year.
Learn how research helps us understand changes in the world around us, discover more about the places the Trust cares for and find practical solutions to conservation problems.
Find out more about what the National Trust's strategic objectives are in the vital area of research, and how we will enact and deliver on these aims.
