From cosmos to classroom: National Lottery Open Week meets British Science Week

The Science of Open Week 2026

Many Science venues and organisations are saying thanks to National Lottery players, all using their own methods.

Up in the Highlands at Hugh Miller's Birthplace Cottage, The National Trust for Scotland is offering free entry, one adult per National Lottery ticket. A unique letter written by Charles Darwin is going on display as Hugh himself was a natural history expert, so the museum features artefacts, fossil finds, manuscripts, a shepherd's plaid and a stonemason’s mallet. Visitors can also get hands-on with fossils in our interactive handling collection.

Meanwhile in the West Midlands there’s 50% off entry to Thinktank, Birmingham Science Museum.

And here’s a handful of Space-focused sites saying thanks to National Lottery players for raising funds that go to good causes like theirs:

Armagh Observatory and Planetarium is on board for the Open Week 2026 mission – offering 50% off dome shows through 15th March, and 50% off telescope observatory tour on 14th March.

Aerospace Bristol is offering players a free tour free tour of the Conservation in Action Workshop through 13th March.

And The National Space Centre, Leicester - celebrating its 25th year - is offering boosters to any ticket bought for the day – upgrading it to a Free Annual Pass, as well as adding a 30-minute presenter-led 'tour of the night sky' in the UK’s largest planetarium at no extra charge.

Spotlight on Space Science

Everything from major builds like the National Space Centre, to local Astronomy Societies and other scientific good causes have been awarded funds raised by National Lottery players.

Chas Bishop, CEO of The National Space Centre, Leicester, reflects on The National Lottery’s two grants (total £33m) that effectively let the Leicester site blast off 25 years ago:

“The site [for the Space Cantre] was a sewage works - it smelled terrible. It took something seismic to turn it into something useful. If it wasn't for National Lottery funding...”

Deep impacts

Like other good causes funded by The National Lottery, The National Space Centre has an array of positive results, and real impacts.

As well as being a key piece of infrastructure for Space Science in the UK, the Centre has helped spark local regeneration. “For ten years we were on our own in the sewage works,” Chas explains, “with a lot of hope that the wider site would be bought into industrial use, that we would be the catalyst. Wind the clock forward to 2025 and we’ve got something like 80 companies on site.”

What’s more, diverse impacts are being racked up the Centre each year. “We’ve had over 6 million visitors since 2001,” says Chas. “In 2024 alone 16,000 students of whom 15,000 were given free provision.”

In case you’re still not convinced, Chas nails whey we should all care about Space and having a National Space Centre:

“We couldn't live without Space. You have used Space, probably, a dozen times today without thinking about it. It’s the framework which allows not just Sat Nav but communications, banking, insurance, everything we rely on, day-to-day.”

‘Sci’ highlights in National Lottery history

Of course, there’s much more to science than Space. From Astronomy Clubs to Zoological Societies – funds for good causes raised by National Lottery have answered the call. From Royal Society ‘rock star Scientists’ to citizen scientists; doing science or teaching science at universities and in communities all over the UK from the Shetland Isles to the Isles of Scilly.

Since that first ever Science-based grant to what was 'Manchester Museum of Science & Industry' back in spring 1995, a constellation of funding has exploded across the UK. Fast approaching 30,000 science grants.

A wide spectrum of science

So, what ties together The National Space Centre with Cancer therapy? Or The Natural History Museum’s Darwin Centre with Drug repurposing for rare diseases? How about the missing link between Lindow Man and Leukaemia research?

All have been among the recipients of National Lottery funds (1995-2025). From major buildings to Science Ed’ school trips or science club apparatus. Places, projects, and people have benefitted from the 30-year National Lottery ‘experiment’.

Here’s a dozen highlights from National Lottery funding history – adding in to the mix environmental science (climate action, biodiversity etc):

• The Eden Project, living and breathing environmental science, and awarded various National Lottery grants totalling over £175m since 1997
• Groundwork UK (The Federation of Groundwork Trusts) science-backed projects all over the UK, totalling over £170m since 1995 (and their total does not include many other grant funds to The Groundwork Trust Ltd as well as many local Groundwork trusts).
• Natural England, over £107m since 1999
• The Science Museum Group, over £67m since 1995, including The Science Museum’s Wellcome Wing, London, a grant for £23m in 1996.
• Kew Gardens (Royal Botanical Gardens, London) over £50m since 1999
• Glasgow Science Centre Limited, over £37m since 1997
• The University of Manchester, over £35m since 1997 including over £12m in 2015 for First Light exhibition space at Jodrell Bank (radio astronomy observatory founded in 1945 in Cheshire)
• The National Space Centre, Leicester, over £32m since 1998
• Natural History Museum, London, over £32m since 1995, e.g. The Darwin Centre £20m in 2001
• National Botanic Garden of Wales, over £26m since 1996
• European Maritime Institute of Hull Limited, over £24m since 1997
• Belfast City Council, over £23m in 2008 funded the Connswater Community Greenway, a green corridor alongside the Connswater, Knock and Loop rivers from the Castlereagh Hills to Belfast Lough. The Greenway set out to provide: 5km of cleaned rivers, 43 new bridges, 19km of cycle and walkways, improved and connected green and open spaces, a public square, heritage trails and a 9km linear park through East Belfast.
  

Of course, National Lottery grants - in all walks of life, not just science - are an ever-expanding universe.

The running total of grants awarded to science-focused buildings, facilities; funds backing key organisations; funding research, driving engagement projects, and boosting education of all kinds of science is rocketing on upwards, glimpsing sight of £3b.

That’s a gigantic galaxy of impact, all thanks to National Lottery players.