Cultural place-shaping and planning policy
Arts and culture play an integral and valuable role in making prosperous, healthy and attractive places. Bringing people together, arts and culture provide a sense of vitality in our local areas; on our high streets, our town centres and in regeneration areas; contributing much to the current and future health and growth of where we live, work and play.
Cultural Planning supports place making through considering what arts and cultural provision and infrastructure can be secured through redevelopment and the planning process.
The arts and culture service provides strategic leadership, projects and support for external partners in the regeneration and retail sectors. With our partners, we have secured temporary and long-term subsidised spaces for cultural occupiers and created tangible opportunities for artists, creative organisations and communities, and learning opportunities for young people with creative participation at the heart.
Public funding such as via the GLA and Arts Council England, can facilitate local regeneration and cultural programming. The arts and culture service secures new funding and project delivery and participates in working groups to champion and embed arts and culture through new urban design improvements.
Cultural Planning Resources
In 2025, Wandsworth revised its Supplementary Planning Document (SPD) for Planning Obligations. Any development scheme over 100 dwellings or above 10,000sqm non-residential space has to provide a cultural action plan in discussion and agreement with the council’s arts service and the planning officer.
A developer may provide a cultural action plan through discussion and agreement with the art and culture service and the borough, or make a commuted sum payment for the borough to invest in local cultural infrastructure and provision. Section 106 contributions may be pooled in a locality.
Wandsworth’s Arts and Culture Strategy is supported by the Local Plan and by relevant Masterplans and Cultural Guidance Notes, that set out the benefits and outcomes Wandsworth would like to secure such as:
- Subsidised space for cultural tenants and creative workspace including artist studios
- Permanent arts commissions integrated within landscaping or building features
- Early activation through temporary creative projects through the development’s construction phase
- Support for local festivals or other cultural programmes
- Tangible creative ways for local communities to participate or learn
If you are a developer or a consultant working on a local cultural plan please contact us to discuss your proposals.
Policies and guidance
Other relevant London Policies and Guidance notes available for downloads: