Webinar on Reinstating Historic Shopfronts With Grant Aid

Speakers: Owain, Hannah, Clive Fletcher

Owain: Thank you, Hannah. And welcome, everyone, to the third in a series of Historic England webinars focused on historic high streets. It has been developed as part of our High Street Heritage Action Zones programme. Last week, Katie Carmichael talked about the history of shop fronts and their design. This week, Clive Fletcher, our principal advisor in our Midlands region will be talking about shopfronts. But this time, the focus will be on the technical, logistical and administrative issues surrounding their reinstatement.

I'm here to provide a brief introduction to the webinar series, the High Streets Programme more widely, and also why this work is so important. High streets are hugely important spaces. Economically, they provide employment and generate billions of pounds. Socially, they are places where people can meet and come together and play an important role in supporting community cohesion. And culturally, they are the locations of many of our important cultural assets, such as museums, art galleries and libraries. As high streets struggle, so do these spaces. Historic England's High Streets Heritage Action Zones programme is designed to help these important places to adapt to the needs of their local community, to use their historic character to bring people back. As more of us shop online, as we've had to this year, there is less need for people to visit high streets. So they have to become places where people want to visit, where people want--

[they discuss the sound level for the webinar]

Owain: As more of us shop online, there is less need for people to visit high streets. As they have become places where people want to visit, where people want to spend their leisure time, the quality of the environment, the character of the place is so important to making that happen, and our high streets are in heritage. Not all of it might be obvious, but it is there. Our High Streets Heritage Action Zones programme seeks to change people's perception of places, to highlight the heritage and to give these places back their character or their distinctiveness. Key to that is clearly their shopfronts. When we think about images of high streets, we think about pictures of shopfronts. They contribute so much to that local character. Last week, Katie provided us with an insight into the history of shopfronts, and for those that missed it, it was recorded and ready to be listened to at your earliest convenience from the Historic England website.

Today, in the company of Clive Fletcher, we will be looking at the repair and reinstatement of shopfronts, building on his experience of projects that have done just that. Just before I hand over to Clive, I would like to point out the final webinar of this series takes place next Wednesday and will focus on community engagement in high street projects. This series of webinars have been designed to build on Historic England's [indistinct] heritage to regenerate places. Whilst our programme will be working directly with 68 high streets, we hope that the learning we are developing in those places [indistinct] far more widely. And with that, I'd like to pass you all over to Clive Fletcher.

Clive: Thanks Owain for that introduction. Yes, I'm Clive Fletcher. I've been working on historic high street schemes now for probably 24 years, the majority of my working career involved in urban regeneration. And as Owain has explained, I'm here to talk about the reinstatement of shopfronts with Grant Aid, which is slightly different from design of shopfronts and the planning process, as we'll see. What you can see in front of you is a shopfront in-- well, a series of shopfronts in Spalding and what's coming up.

[indistinct] original shopfront that that was the original condition of the building that that was turned from. This building was unlettable, largely, and has been vacant for a long, long time. And after the works were done, it was fully let, and in fact, there were group viewings for people that wanted to take on the flats above and the shop units below.

So, what we'll cover. Well, this is a subject which has quite a few facets associated with it. But as Owain has said, these are procedural. They're also technical. They're also to do with hearts and minds because you'll be dealing with people [with?] their own sort of levels of experience from this type of thing and their own wants and needs as far as their business is concerned, similarly with architects and also with contractors. So we'll be looking at that as well.

Now, as Owain has alighted on and alluded to, the core principles of this type of work is to address problems of the sort of downward spiral of sort of dilapidation that high streets very often undergo. And this results in a loss of confidence, a lack of willingness to invest and so on and so forth. So you end up with vacant units, and vacant units spawn further vacant units, as the critical mass of people in the high street trading sort of drops below what's necessary to attract sufficient numbers of people to go there. And this can be reversed using a programme of Grant Aid, such as our own [Seek a Scheme?] and also now Highstreet Heritage Action Zones.

There's an example of a shopfront in Boston, which was restored and brought back from the dead really, using quite a substantial grant from [Seek a Schemes?]. A key aspect of this is the delight, I think, that historic shopfronts provide for the high street. And what you can see in front of you here are a selection of restored and reinstated shopfronts. But what it always shows is a absolutely fanatical attention to detail, because that's where the delight lies, the use of curved glass where necessary, substantial but quite refined glazing profiles and the sort of virtuosity of the different materials involved. You've got stained glass there, glazed bricks, beautiful joinery, etc., and so on and so forth.

So, what are we talking about here? Well, High Street Heritage Action Zones are what we call third-party grant schemes. Obviously Historic England is one party, local authority is another, and we're typically the main partners in these projects, but not always. And then the third party is either the applicant – it's very easy – is the applicant, which is either the shop owner or maybe a lease holder. And they make applications generally with the help of their own architect, or an architect they appoint, guided by local authority officers. And I'm either a project officer or sometimes a conservation officer.

In order to do this, it's important that whoever's performing these negotiations gets familiar with the terms of what constitutes an historic shopfront, because very often the negotiation will involve explaining what historic shopfronts are all about to the people involved. This sort of information can be found in a vast array of historic shopfront design guides, which are available around the country, and a simple Google search will put you in touch with any number of them.

The important thing to remember about the design approach is for authentic reinstatement, not a sort of pale pastiche. So the successfully designed shopfront will look essentially indistinguishable from one that's been there all the time, so when you're walking down the high street, you don't think, oh here's a load of new shopfronts. You think, oh what a lovely historic high street. So it's all about authenticity. In order to achieve this, quite often the design process can go through several iterations. We are trying out certain things that a certain amount of interpretation very often to be made at a sort of detailed design level: joinery, profiles and so forth. But in general, it's about studious scrutinising of evidence and interpretation of that into a design that looks, to all intents and purposes, identical to what the evidence suggests.

Now, the source of this evidence are normally historic photographs, and these are generally available from resources such as Picture the Past here in Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire and Francis Frith, etc., and there are numerous others available, available online, Googleable, if you put addresses in. And also there are any number of sort of local history books that can provide this type of thing.

Also, local owners. The applicants will quite frequently be able to lay their hands on photographs of their building in times past and sometimes as a sort of public engagement. An appeal for photographs can sometimes bear fruit. More rarely, if you're really lucky, there will be historic drawings, original architects' drawings of the photograph that's been lost-- sorry, of the shopfront that's been lost. And that provides, really, an unparalleled resource, which enables you to work direct from that to create a planning application and an application for Grant Aid.

Here's an example of some evidence that becomes apparent simply by stripping away a modern shopfront, and this is part of a historic shopfront that has survived underneath the previous shopfront, and so sometimes a judicious and sensitive revealing process, obviously done by the applicant and his architect, can give you a good head start and also actually save money when it comes to reinstatement because obviously those parts of it won't need to be reinstated. They simply need to be repaired and finished.

Here's an example of a run of shops in a place called Wheeler Gate, in Nottingham – architect designed – and it was possible using the county records office to find the original designs of this building and base the designs for the new reinstated shopfronts on it. However, photographic evidence suggested that this design was more or less implemented, but not quite, and there had been subsequently some modifications to it. So that enabled us to tweak this design somewhat and actually produce something which I think is slightly more interesting and actually slightly more authentic.

We've touched on it so far, but revealing historic shopfronts is very often more of a project than you think it's going to be. This is number 38, Carrington Street in Nottingham, part of a [indistinct] heritage initiative, which is also part of the Nottingham Heritage Action Zone.

It's Nottingham's urban room, which is a key project in our Heritage Action, funded by a broad partnership. But when we were presented with a property which was secured by Nottingham City Council for this use, it wasn't terribly prepossessing. It had a suspended ceiling put in.

Much of the shopfront appeared to have been lost and it was looking quite shabby. But with some uncovering, we discovered that actually the majority of the shopfront still spied, and what was particularly interesting was the highly unusual and, turns out, quite locally distinctive use of glass install risers, using glass panels instead of timber panels, which actually lets more light in and creating quite a striking design.

Here, aspects of the door were reinstated and, of course, had a great paint job with sign writing, but I'm sure you'll agree this is a fantastic example of how a shopfront can be brought back from the dead, as it were. You'll see that the suspended ceiling was removed, as well, and sort of a fairly modern type of lighting reinstated, allowing the full height of the space to be appreciated, which we find tends to create quite a sort of great environment inside the shop as well, adding value in that respect, too.

The materials. Obviously the most common material you'll find is timber. That's structurally strong. It's easily shaped. It can be created into all sorts of architectural forms. Historically, it tended to be softwood, slow-grown softwood though, not the sort of softwood we get today, typically, although it can still be sourced. This was typically from the Baltic states in the east of the country and over from America in the West. These are very large pines that were felled, which had a huge amount of hardwood in it, which meant that it had a lot of resins and tannic acids and so on and so forth, which gave it great longevity. Anybody who has restored a sash window from the 18th century will realise just how good the timber was. These days, it's slightly more difficult to source. I remember in our Derby project, what was actually used there was a tropical, sustainably sourced hardwood, because that was felt to be actually more durable. You also find various materials used to store risers, including timber, but also stone, glazed brick, brick, sometimes render. Very occasionally, you'll encounter a cast iron or bronze shopfront. These are generally the most expensive ones to replicate. Very often, though, they were painted, and so if funds are tight, you can actually replicate something that looks very, very similar, if not identical, using an appropriate painted timber. This is, however, one that was reinstated in Derby on Iron Gate, which is a former electrical store, which is, I think, why they used metal at the time in order to reflect the sort of modernity of their offer.

This is an example of glazed brick, which is being used as a store riser, and I think it's very effective and also has the benefit of being very durable. This is a good example of a shopfront that responds to the character of the building. I think previously there'd been an emerging proposal to come forward to put a Victorian-style shopfront on this building, which the project officer correctly identified as being inappropriate, simply because the building post-dated the Victorian period. Evidence arose showing a much more 20th-century design, slightly sleeker, and this was put in place, which I'm sure you'll agree is a very pleasing example.

And when it comes to repairs, it's important to note that we're talking about technology, which has its own way of working. I can recommend the Historic England Practical Conservation series on a range of the materials. You can search our website. You'll be able to find these publications. They're also available second hand, as well from second-hand bookshops and Amazon and so on and so forth. They're worth looking at if you need anything from an introduction to sort of highly technical information about the sorts of approaches necessary for different materials and different problems.

The important thing to remember about shopfront detailing is it's not just there to be decorative, it's there for purpose. It combines strength and elegance. It forms the structure. If details are simply stuck on in a way that otherwise looks identical to what a traditional shopfront would look like, the eventual structure would be far weakened, and so it's important that timber panels, for instance, are properly constructed timber panels, not simply panels with planted-on details in relief. And this can be secured through requiring sectional drawings, through joinery, working drawings, showing how the timber work is constructed. You'll find sometimes that architects won't know how to do this and they'll need a hand. However, if you're employing conservation-accredited architects, that shouldn't be the case.

Traditional details are also designed to shed rainwater. That's true of stonework, but also the woodwork in shopfronts, too, and you'll find that there are drips built in. When you're interpreting this, you'll be needing to use precedent that you can find, possibly, on the ground or using the expertise of your architect to bring in details that you possibly can't spot from the available evidence. It's important to do this, otherwise you may end up with, for instance, rainwater settling on horizontal timber plains or collecting on the bottom of sills, etc. So, important to look at.

Detailing. Now, door furniture is often overlooked, as are thresholds, but these are just two aspects of detailing, but important to get right. And they can add quite a lot of value because everybody looks at the threshold as they're walking in, particular if there's a step.

Finishes. Obviously, when the shopfront has been completed, the finish is critical. Getting the right finish on the shopfront is critical because that's the thing that will not only secure its long-term performance, but also it has a cosmetic aspect as well, that the shopfront will be important to the future use of the building as a shop. This will include sign writing. There are a huge number of very accomplished sign writers out there and a good sign-written fascia panel looks fantastic. I think it's also worth looking at the wider building, and quite often there's evidence that can present itself that will show that there was sign writing on other aspects of the building, such as the main part of the elevation. This is a slide of a building in Boston. It's actually part of the first purpose-built shopping arcade-- sorry, shopping parade in the country from the late 18th century. It's grade 2 listed. And in fact, old photographs and prints show the entire run of these shopfronts and buildings covered in sign writing, which is quite characteristic of the square.

Blinds and awnings are important. Very often you'll find a blind box, which hasn't been brought out for a very long time. Sometimes this is because they presented a hazard to traffic and sometimes you will see that they've been hit previously. And this can have a fairly catastrophic effect on the shopfront, as you can imagine. However, in areas where pavements have been widened or in pedestrianised areas, these should be reinstated because they are a fantastically characterful part of the shopfront and lend a huge amount of interest to the street scene, but also an opportunity for additional advertising, as you can see here. This is a modern blind box, but you will sometimes find that the original blind boxes contain the original lines and simply need bringing out again.

Research will often show that previous historic shopfronts had a separate street entrance incorporated in it to give access to the floor residences. Now, this is a hot topic, obviously, because we're wanting upper floors to be reused increasingly. I've done a webinar about this previously. It makes the building much more economically sustainable and actually civilises the street by providing things like [indistinct] surveillance and enables enhanced levels of investment in the building over time. This is a building in Sadler Gate in Derby with one put in, and it's important to sort of bring this as an issue to the owner, as a potential benefit of the project where the evidence suggests it's possible. And where it is, you should ask him or her to consider reinstating the staircase behind, to enable this rather than simply having the door put back on its own.

Just a few technical issues here, not that the others aren't technical, but that's just an assortment here. So we've touched on technical drawings and the importance of how joinery is put together, but there are other issues, such as, for instance, bressummers. And what you can see here is a side of the building that was coming forward for a shopfront. Unfortunately, the owners who are a national chain decided to pull out in the end, but one of the issues that was there preventing immediate reinstatement of a shopfront was a low bressummer that had been put in place when the modern shopfront had been installed. A bressummer is a beam that supports the building above. And sometimes it's necessary to altogether take this out – it's quite an expensive piece of work – and put it at a higher level if you're wanting to reinstate the original line of the shopfront.

Suspended ceilings can be tackled without necessarily taking them all out. Sometimes this will require a level of intervention into the shop that the shopkeeper isn't happy with, but you can actually simply draw back the suspended ceiling and put it behind a bulkhead, allowing the clerestory upper windows of the shopfront, which are almost always a feature of shopfronts to be used for what they're intended: to let in light. It's important to note that frequently historical shopfronts had cast-iron columns within the shop, supporting the weight of the building above. Sometimes these had been removed, and other times not, very often boxed in so you can't see them, and they provide the structural strength under which you can quite often have quite a refined timber shopfront, more refined than you'd otherwise be able to do.

So, permissions. You'll almost always find planning permissions necessary if you're putting in a replacement shopfront, because the purpose of this is to make a material change, and that's the test for planning permission and also listed-building consent if it affects the building's special interest. However, it's important to note that you can't simply take the designs that have been approved in isolation by planning and building consent necessarily and give them grant aid, because what may be acceptable on its own as to building consent for planning permission won't necessarily be good enough for grant aid. Bear in mind, many historic buildings have had quite inappropriate shopfronts – that's the reason why we're doing this – planted on the front of them, and even a moderate gain will be sufficient to enable planning permission orders to building consent to be approved.

So, when it comes to Grant Aid, we're looking for authentic reinstatement, which is something that our planning colleagues often can't ask for-- or demand, rather. So it's important that where an applicant is applying for a grant that the negotiation for the shopfront is done with yourselves and with any planning officer or conservation officer that's negotiating the permissions and consents. Sometimes it's also-- if you have a good relationship with your planning colleagues and good communication, they can often put you in touch with an applicant, somebody that's already put in an application or is having pre-application discussions, who is unaware of the shopfront scheme. And this completely can change the direction of negotiations as they become interested in what's possible.

Building regulations is another issue. Sometimes local authorities require building regulations consent for new shopfronts. On other occasions I've known them not to, but it's mainly about access. And within building regulations, there is a reasonable and practical caveat [indistinct], as it relates to historic buildings. Essentially, it's saying that if you can achieve compliance without affecting the building's historic interest significance, then it should be done. And the corollary of that is, of course, that if it's very harmful, it shouldn't be done or it doesn't have to be done. But this is only really negotiable between the building regulations officer and the local conservation officer and/or HAZ project officer. And what you can see here is a building with a small front step in the Strand in Derby, and there's a replacement shopfront. And as you can see, the door location has changed and it's a very small slope up to the shop level, enabling wheelchair access, and it's making things easier without actually affecting the character of the new shopfront whatsoever.

Procurement's an important thing to bear in mind. A very dry subject, but important. Our own procurement rules require application over £10,000 to require competitive tendering from at least three contractors. You'll have to check your own procurement rules within your local authority; they may vary slightly. If the architect's fees are likely to exceed this level as well, they need to be tended for and, generally, as a percentage of the project value. However, given that architect's fees are typically between 10 and 14 percent of the overall project value, it's unlikely they'll be over £10,000. They may be, but it's unlikely for a shopfront job. But I would contact your own auditing section to find out what the precise regulations are with your local authority.

Now, this is the meat of the thing, really. This is the hearts and minds-type stuff: working with contractors, architects, applicants. And the important thing to know is that not many architects, even conservation architects, have ever designed a shopfront. This is a voyage of discovery for them. You often need, therefore, to work pretty closely with them, and scrutinising evidence with them, asking for evidence from them, providing them with evidence. It's quite a two-way process, and it's also helpful to check the design specification schedule before it goes out to tender, just in case they've got something wrong. We've known it not to be clear, for instance, whether plywood is OK for the majority of the shopfront to be expressed in a tendering document. And of course, if people tender for that, then they tendered for something that can't be actually grant-aided, and the whole process has to be repeated. So it's worthwhile just checking if those things are compliant prior to them going out to tender; in fact, throughout the process, just to make sure everything's okay. And that's the after photograph of it, in case you didn't spot it, because it's a fairly different-looking building.

This is part of a boutique hotel which is being created in Boston. We had four buildings here, two on the street and two on the other, which were joined at the back. In fact, five – the building next to it as well, part of the Comprehensive project, which has utterly transformed the streets [indistinct]. The other thing to note is that the negotiation was going through. The architect will also inevitably involve the applicant, probably the shopkeeper, quite possibly in face-to-face discussions when we're not in the current lockdown situation.

Now, no different from architects, it's almost inconceivable that the shopkeeper would have been involved in any sort of restoration project before – certainly not my experience. And so it's a voyage of discovery for them. Once they've done it, very often they find they're the chief advocates for your scheme because it's such an interesting and rewarding process, but it is quite a challenging one whilst you're going through it. And so being able to provide them with good evidence of what they can expect is pretty important, giving them confidence too, being on top of the information, knowing all the terms, knowing this process that you'll have to go through. It's important so they feel that they've got a point of contact they can come to where they'll be able to get all the answers. I can't emphasise that enough; them having confidence in you is critical to the success of the scheme, [indistinct], administration of the scheme, of course.

This is an example of just that. This is in Sincil Street, in Lincoln, former conservation area at risk. I think it probably still is because it's coming to the end of this project, which will hopefully take it off. And here we showed the local authority-- sorry, we showed the owner of Sincil Street, which is the Lincolnshire co-op, what had been achieved in Derby and they went away and were quite-- it captured their imagination, and then that stimulated them to talk to a planning team, the conservation officer in Lincoln, who helped them design these fantastic shopfronts, and there's a row of, must be, 20 shopfronts that have been reinstated to this sort of standard. It's absolutely fantastic. Of course, you may find examples of this close to home, but if not I'm sure we've got examples that we can show you if you contact your local Historic England office.

You sometimes get objections, which are pretty understandable, because they perceive, as well as gaining something, that they might be losing something. I don't want a recessed entrance is a good one. That's very common. However, if the historic shopfront had a recessed entrance, then they need to have one. They don't always, but as I say, this is about reinstatement. Sometimes it's to do with loss of floor space, but very often these recessed entrances are only 0.75 of a metre or something like that, so it's not huge.

They also tend to want deep a fascia very often, and they'll be reducing the size of their fascia when they, very often, when they reinstate a historic shopfront. And sometimes this can be overcome by grant-aiding a hanging shopfront-- sorry, a hanging sign. I'm not suggesting one as big as this, which is actually a historic site. This is in Spalding, an area where we had a grand scheme, but a more modest one can have the effect that's even better than a deep fascia because it allows you to see what you're approaching as you're walking down the street. Another one is that they need internally illuminated signage, and of course, that's contrary to most planning policy. But of course, it's also not grant-aidable, so that can simply be ruled out.

And the other aspect is that contractors have hardly ever done a historic shopfront but often tell you that they know best, some of them with some justification, because they've been working on these sorts of things for a long time, but very often just because they have insufficient knowledge, and sometimes they have insufficient knowledge of even the basics. So it's important to be confident, know what you're talking about, read up on the subject and be sure of your ground. Use of things like lime mortars, use of traditional joinery, profiling, etc. You are the ultimate authority on quality control on this. If you're not happy with it, they don't get paid. It's the ultimate sanction, but unfortunately that's what it has to come to on very rare occasions. But you have the power in order to make them work to the appropriate standard, and it needs to be, not only for the success of the scheme, but also to ensure good value for the owner that's spending his hard-earned or her hard-earned money on the new shopfront. Sometimes this extends to going into joiners' workshops and checking out work in progress so that you can nip problems in the bud.

Unforeseen works. Sometimes you'll find a rotten bressummer which needs replacing. Now, this won't be possible to tell at the Grant Aid stage, and then it might come in for some more money. And at that point, it is possible to increase the grant amount. You'll want to check it with a QS to check that it's reasonable, but sometimes this sort of thing can make the project fail if the owner can't afford 100% of the additional works, so that's just something to bear in mind. In other circumstances where simply a contractor is under-quoted, it's not possible to increase the grant.

Shopfront security. Sometimes you can find historic examples, which can be reinstated. Of course, roller shutter should be resisted, but one thing you can do is install very, very thick glass, 10–15mm glass. Toughened glass is almost as good an alternative as roller shutters, simply because it's virtually impregnable. And doorways can be made secure, particularly recessed doorways with the use of a traditional iron security gate. There's one in Sadler Gate in Derby that's being put in.

Monitoring. We're nearly at the end now. It's important to walk around your area, when there's works underway, on a regular basis, and I'm talking maybe a couple of times a week just to check how things are going on. This is a shopfront I spotted in Sleaford several months ago now. I'm happy to say that it's gone in perfectly now, and it's a very, very attractive and authentic-looking shopfront. However, what we saw here was an incorrect application of plans, and you've got a column capital there which is sticking out far too much, and it would have simply rotted eventually because the water would have settled on it. I alerted the architect. This is the architect's job, but sometimes they need a bit of help, and it's worth it because in the end, the problem ends up on your plate if you don't catch it.

Payment. You shouldn't really be, or rather the applicant and the architect shouldn't really be looking to pay until you've looked at the works and are happy with them, because it's very difficult to rectify anything once they have paid, and they might be left holding the baby, as it were. Sometimes stage payments are possible. Unfortunately, a stage payment was made here on this shopfront. You may think, fantastic, what a brilliant transformation. And it is, but unfortunately the last stage payment fell just before the lead capping was put on its shopfront, and it was left without a lead capping for a year, during which time it started to rot because the contractor just walked off site because he'd been paid the majority of how much he was owed. So that's something to just bear in mind. Try and keep it to whole items, such as a shopfront, a full roof, etc., so you're not left with half a job.

So, just final tips, be confident. This is a brilliant opportunity for a shop owner. You can absolutely transform the fortunes of a building. Makes it much more attractive, much more sustainable, very often. But negotiations can take time, and it's worth taking the time. You're building a relationship, very often, with the shop owner, the architect, etc., etc., and each successful project will spawn new interest, hopefully using contractors, architects and possibly even building owners that you've already been talking to, who will be advocating the project if they've experienced a successful outcome. I think that leaves the way open for questions.

Hannah: Fantastic, Clive. Thank you so much. That was absolutely brilliant. Not sure I've ever had a webinar where there's been quite so many useful tips to write down whilst I'm listening to it. That was really great. Thank you. And yes, I think the quality of the webinar's been backed up by the quality of the chat going on. I can say we've had lots of questions already come through. For those of you that are thinking about a question or you've been holding out-- No, not that one. Bear with me. I'm just going to move a little box over-- no I'm not. I'm trying, a little Q&A box, here we go. Pop it in here under final tips. So, if you would like to type your questions in here. Try to keep them relatively short, both [indistinct] because I have to read them out, and also, because if they're too long, they will cut off, I'm afraid. If you type them in there, then they'll start popping up and we'll also be able to download them at the end of the webinar.

But whilst we wait for you guys to get typing, we've had a few questions in the chat already. I'll go back to some of those, Clive. Now, we had one early on, which I know you did touch on as well, but the question was, 'I know this is contentious, but having run several THIs and HERs alongside a conservation role, I had a very forward-thinking head of planning who was happy to not ask for permissions as they are an expensive barrier. What are your thoughts?' And we had a few general replies in the chat, but I wondered if you could address that one as well, Clive.

Clive: Well, it is down to each local planning authority to determine what's material and what effects architectural and historic interest. We've seen that around the country when it comes to, for instance, church rooves. But my own experience is that results in such an obvious change that-- I've never encountered it before. It's been the case that these things have required permission, simply because the corollary of that is if somebody wants to take it out at a later stage, you would obviously be asking for the planning permission to do that. It comes within the remit of control, and that's the way you manage to secure the investment without having planning control [indistinct] applying to it. Then you can't secure the investment, so I would suggest that although it's obviously been done in the spirit of helpfulness, there may be unintended consequences if you don't ask for permission.

Hannah: So possible, but with caution.

Clive: I wouldn't even go that far.

Hannah: OK.

Clive: I would just caution it.

Hannah: OK, quite fair enough. Something a little bit more technical, I should say, the question about roller shutters. You, of course, said they need to be avoided, and certainly modern ones, that the question is late 19th-century or Edwardian shopfronts can have the roller shutter as well as a blind box. If they existed, surely they should be repaired or reinstated. What do you think on that?

Clive: Oh, absolutely. Of course. I mean, I haven't been fortunate enough to encounter any. I must have grant-aided literally hundreds of shopfronts over my time, but not one of them has had one. But they do exist. I have heard of them. And of course, if that's the case, there are often timber ones – I've seen photographs of timber roller shutters in the past – then that would be a great addition. I mean, sometimes local authorities have policies against this sort of thing, simply because they want people to be able to see into shopfronts during the night time, night time economy and so on and so forth. But given the objectives of the project, authentic reinstatement, if the owner wanted it and he had sufficient evidence to justify it then certainly that would be eligible.

Hannah: Lovely, thank you. And a follow-on, subsequent question to that, how are internal roller shutters taken?

Clive: Well, of course, they don't require planning permission and tend to have a pretty sympathetic approach to that if people want to put internal roller shutters in. But if I can restate the advice about 10–15mm glass, I mean, we've got shopfronts, jewellers, that we've funded in the past, without roller shutters, without any form of security, just the glass, because the glass is strong enough, designed to withstand shotguns, that sort of thing. So you can actually achieve the security that you need using glass, or a huge amount of it anyway. You have to ask yourself, if someone's going to get through something that tough, how long are they going to have to be there?

Hannah: I was thinking the same. Yes, I wrote down the 10–15 mil. toughened glass in my notes. So yes, I suspect you're right. If you manage to persuade them on the glass, then the internal roller shutters, probably, hopefully, be unnecessary for people. Yeah. Fantastic. OK, let's see. Do keep adding in questions, everyone. I can see a quick question, which is more for me, which is the recorded session will be downloadable from the webinar pages on the HE website. If you go back to where you clicked the link to book after the webinars are finished, that's where you can also access the pre-recorded ones.

Hannah: Right, back to Clive. And again, I think you did touch on this, but the question was, while the presentation was going on, if additional and expensive structural work need to take place, can funding be available at a higher rate? These are often works that are unlikely to be undertaken if a new shopfront was not granted-aided.

Clive: You're asking, if stuff becomes apparent-- works become apparent into the job, whether you can increase the grant. Is that right?

Hannah: I think so, yes. Perhaps the questioner might add a further note if they want a different question answered. But, I mean, you did address that with the bressummer, of course, you know, completely unexpected repairs might--

Clive: I'll address it in two ways. In that respect and also in terms of, I guess, value for money. Now, although these schemes have quite large amounts of money – they're larger than you're normally used when it comes to an historic environment – they are limited. And so when it comes to judging value for money, you may have questions about a shopfront costing £100,000, whereas one next to it with another owner, who can provide the same level of impact for much less because they don't have the same structural issues, now that's something for you, that's something for your own during delivery panels or boards or whatever, revenue, decision making, [indistinct]. But yes, sometimes it is absolutely necessary to put in structural work. But not only structural work, you may, for instance, need to get the rainwater sorted out before you reinstate a shopfront. I remember once entering a shop owner that wanted to reinstate a shopfront, and he was completely wrong. The reason was is because there was green mould all the way down the shopfront because the gutters were leaking, and it hadn't occurred to him to actually replace this. So sometimes it's-- well, quite often it's necessary to do some form of structural repair. Sometimes it's not apparent that that's necessary until you jump start it.

Hannah: I think we've got quite a good technical one here for you, Clive, that's just come in, which is about the grant rate percentages. Is there a magic number that is likely to encourage applications from businesses for shopfronts?

Clive: Well, we typically look at 70–80%, sometimes higher. I've known Townscape Heritage schemes which, following consultation with commercial surveyors locally, identified a figure of even higher than that, 95%. And of course, we're in unprecedented times at the moment. The important thing is to ensure take-up. It's no good having these budgets unless we spend them. It's no good having standards as far as value for money are concerned and if it results in no activity. We're in an incredibly challenging time at the moment. It's very challenging for small-to-medium-sized businesses anyway. Investing in this type of thing, even where they're only looking for 20/10%, is still a significant commitment because there's a certain amount of work that needs to be done prior to the application being made. They're often operating on the margins. They need to save up the money in order to get the match.

So there's two things, really, that allow them to do that. First of all is the sense they're going to get something good out of it, so that's where we go back to confidence and also showing them what the likely outcomes are going to be. But also just pitching it right. There are some places where there's lots of money sloshing around, and all that's necessary is the sort of nudge to get them over the line sort of thing so that they don't feel that they're doing it without help. And they might be looking at sort of 70%, a very, very prosperous area where there's other people going and doing that type of thing. But in much less prosperous areas, which I suspect are the places that we're looking at, many of you will be involved in, then you might need to start, at least, on a high level, to get the interest. One of the things that I've noticed is that showing is much better than telling, that if you've got a good shopfront that's been done in that town centre with a shopkeeper or property owner very happy with it, that acts as much more of an inducement for them to take up the grant. The only thing you can say to them pretty much, although advocacy is important.

So if I was you, I'd start on the high side, and then, of course, you can look at reviewing your delivery plan later on and perhaps reduce the-- if you're inundated with enquiries after that point, perhaps look at tweaking things slightly.

Hannah: Good point. Yes, of course. It doesn't need to be fixed throughout the period, does it? A couple of people have kindly shared their percentages, as well, in the chat, which is great. So thank you very much for those of you who did. Wonderful. I think we are coming very close to the end of our hour, Clive. So I'm going to squeeze in one last question to you, I think. And let's see, I think it's-- we'll have this last one here from Margot, which is what can be done if a floor layout has changed, an original entrance position, and the owner wants to retain it. What would be your advice there?

Clive: He wants to retain the original floor layout or the existing floor layout?

Hannah: I think the existing, where an original entrance has been moved.

Clive: I think it depends on how much you want to get the shopfront done. The most important thing is getting the shopfront done. Then I think it's important to get the shopfront right so you have the entrances in place that were there in the evidence. But of course, simply because you have an entrance doesn't mean it has to be reflected by a passageway behind it. So you can still have a big shopfront. But what the additional entrance does do, is it enables flexibility in future. And of course, if he or she isn't changing the floor layout, there's less expense on the grant. But if you can convince them to do that, I think it's worth doing. But what it does do is it enables them to be creative in the future, should they want to bring the upper floors back into use, access via a front entrance?

Hannah: Wonderful. OK.