Cathedral Quarter High Street Heritage Action Zone
The Cathedral Quarter High Street Heritage Action Zone follows Gloucester City Council's successful bid for £1.9m to restore some of the architecturally significant buildings in the Westgate area of the City.
What is the High Street Heritage Action Zone?
The High Street Heritage Action Zone programme is a government-funded initiative to fuel the economic, social, and cultural recovery of high streets across England delivered by Historic England.
The Gloucester scheme - known as the Cathedral Quarter project - is run by Gloucester City Council. It covers Westgate Street and the links and lanes off it, from the Cross as far as Lower Quay Street. You can download a map of the zone here (JPG, 12.2 MB).
Over four years (ending March 2024), Cathedral Quarter is working to restore architecturally significant buildings in the zone, bring empty commercial and residential space back into use, improve the public realm, and restore traditional shopfronts and fascia signage alongside a programme of cultural events and activities.
What kind of work have we been doing?
The Folk of Gloucester before and after Cathedral Quarter-funded works ('After' photo © Mark Harrison)
Cathedral Quarter funding has been used up and down the street to restore architecturally or historically significant buildings. At the Folk of Gloucester, for example, Cathedral Quarter funding helped repair and restore the timber-framed facade, making good inappropriate repairs that had taken place previously and restoring a historic colour scheme to the front of these iconic Gloucester buildings. In addition, Cathedral Quarter funding was used to make this community space more accessible.
Elsewhere, Cathedral Quarter funding has brought vacant space back into use. Projects at numbers 14, 29, 39, and 88 Westgate Street have seen new residential units created out of previously empty or unused space.
You can find more information about each of our individual projects on our website.
What are we doing now?
Cathedral Quarter is currently working on implementing public realm improvements, making Westgate Street more attractive to residents, visitors, and businesses. The public realm scheme has been informed by a series of public consultation events and will see improved seating, more greenery, and better interpretation of Westgate's history introduced to the street.
This year we will also be restoring and enhancing historic shopfronts in the Cathedral Quarter zone. The shopfronts scheme aims to restore historic shopfronts where they exist and put back traditional shopfronts and signage where they have been lost. For more information and to apply for a grant, visit our website.
For more information, please email cathedralquarter@gloucester.gov.uk or visit www.cathedralquartergloucester.uk.