Guidance for applicants

What is the Grand Plan fund for?

Any kind of creative project by a person of colour, aged over 18, living in the UK - for which £1,000 would make a huge difference. This fund is for the creative itches that won’t get scratched otherwise.

It can cover the cost of equipment, courses, your time, materials, travel, and whatever your project needs. However, we won’t part-fund projects where £1,000 doesn’t cover the majority of the cost. We are also unlikely to fund projects where company running costs, marketing, or university projects make up a large proportion of the budget. This is because we want Grand Plan to support wild and wonderful creativity and culture, rather than already profitable companies.

We want Grand Plan to help people make things happen - projects that they might find it hard to resource from elsewhere. You’ve got a great idea, tested it out a bit, and now need support making that next step.

Across the grants we give, we try and fund a range of creative practices from across the UK.

How will the judges pick the projects to give grants to?

Once we have your submissions, the Grand Plan team go through and check that they fit the criteria, scoring them using the questions below to create a long list of approximately 30 to 40 applications. Then the judges read them and meet to make a selection.

The main questions we ask when reviewing your applications are:

  • Why you? Is there a clear idea of who you are and why you’re doing what you’re doing? This might be different from other application forms but we want Grand Plan to be as human as possible, so don’t be afraid to be a human in your writing! Give us a sense of your background, where you are coming from, and what you are passionate about. This will help us know why now is the right time, and why you are the right person to make it happen. This doesn’t have to be very long, conceptual, or include lots of fancy accolades. It might be more relevant to tell us a story about why you are where you are at with your creative work, or who or what has shaped or inspired you.

  • Why now? Why is this the right time for you to grow your creative project? Tell us what you have done so far to bring this project to life, and how the money would give you a significant boost. Is there an urgent need that this grant will address or have you pushed your work as far as you can? Or tell us how you haven't been able to have this R&D time before, what a difference it would make for your work long term to be able to do so.

  • Is it realistic to make your project happen for £1,000 or at least cover the majority of costs, and have you given a rough breakdown of how you’d spend the money? For the judges to be able to understand what you need the £1,000 for, it is important to give even a very brief indication of how the money would be spent, broken down into ballpark figures i.e. £200 mentoring, £300 equipment, £400 to pay myself, £100 for materials - or whatever makes sense for your Grand Plan! We don’t need a detailed budget and this can of course change, but give us a rough idea so we can see if your idea is doable with the grant, and why £1,000 will make a difference for you.

  • And lastly, is it likely that you could get the money elsewhere? We want to fund those projects we feel are not as likely to find support from major funders.

We’ve got an open mind: Use the application form to tell us about your plan! And if you don’t know exactly what you want to make, tell us how you’d approach a research period. 

Can I receive support for my application?

If you need support writing or recording your application, or if neither of those work for you due to a disability or access need such as long-term illness or neurodiversity - please don’t hesitate to get in touch with us by emailing info@grandplanfund.co.uk, and we will help you work out an alternative that suits you.

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Top tips for applying

Below are some tips and guidance gathered from previous rounds of reviewing applications and based on what we want Grand Plan to support.

1. Open with a short summary of what your project is about. This really helps us get to grips with exactly what you want to do early on in reading your application and makes it clear what the money would support. It can be hard for judges reading lots of applications to find the idea sometimes, if it is hidden in the rest of your application.

2. Pick a format that works for you! We can accept applications in written, audio or visual form. Work to your skillset and pick a form that you feel most confident in.

3. If submitting a video, please do not add music to the background or add visuals in the video. We really just want you speaking to a camera!

4. Please don’t just send us pre-made PDF or proposal decks on your project. We appreciate you might be applying to lots of different open calls but if you don’t give us proper details answering the question it is hard to see how this grant in particular will be useful to you.

5. When sending examples of your work, it’s a good idea to include links to images, audio, or videos of any pieces, works in progress, or projects that you mention in your application. If you haven’t got them on a website already, a link to Flickr, Vimeo, YouTube, Instagram, or a Google Drive file works as well. This is so we can see what kind of creative you are and visualise or imagine the things you are telling us about. Think about the examples that relate most closely to what you want to do with the money, and bear in mind we won’t have more than a few minutes to review each application, so any long films or audio files will be skimmed.

6. It’s a good idea to write a draft out in another document so you don’t lose anything in the form before submitting it. We respect creatives’ time and would recommend spending no longer than 4 hours writing your application. Don’t feel you have to respond to every sentence of the guidance above; these are meant as helpful pointers in making your application, but not to be stressed over.

7. The judges won’t be looking for the most polished or well-written application, and they won’t police grammar or spelling. They will be selecting applicants based on how exciting your idea sounds and what it would mean for your creativity to receive this support

8. We would much rather receive an application in bullet points than written by AI - we want to hear your voice. The prompt you use to write your application will be more interesting than what an AI can generate.

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Examples of successful applications

To make this process more transparent, we have contacted past grantees and asked if they are happy to share copies of successful applications. You can find a selection of them below, along with short descriptions about the project. These can also be found on the White Pube’s Funding library.

We have redacted key information to keep their identity private - please respect their wishes.

If you have any questions, please get in touch at info@grandplanfund.co.uk


FAQs

  • This is a fund for people of colour and individuals, a duo, group or collective of colour. Please do not apply if you are a company or charity.

  • We know that it’s not a perfect term, and sadly there isn’t one. Because of that, on our application form we simply ask you to decide whether you identify as a part of the Global Majority / a person of colour or not. We’ll trust and respect however you choose to answer that question and we won’t be checking or policing it. For information on why the fund is for people of colour head to our about page.

  • We have tried to make this process as short as possible. On the apply page we ask for your name/contact details, some examples of your work and where you are based.

    We then ask three questions:

    1) What is your Grand Plan? (300 words)

    2) Why is now the right time for your project? (100 words)

    3) How will you spend the money?

    We also accept video or audio responses, but please fill in your details to the form first and remember to name your files with your name in i.e. ‘Joe Bloggs_Video Application’ so we know who you are!

    If you need support writing or recording your application, or if neither of those work for you due to a disability, access needs such as long term illness or neurodiversity - please don’t hesitate to get in touch with us. Please email us at info@grandplanfund.co.uk, and we will help you work out an alternative that suits you.

  • No! It does not need to relate to your ethnicity or be beneficial to a community. You just have to explain why your project is important to you.

  • Yes! Whoever applies will be treated as the ‘lead’ applicant and will be our main point of contact. If successful, we are happy to advertise that we have funded a group, rather than an individual. We can’t fund registered companies or charities.

  • We accept applications from artists who require support. Please just state your relationship to the grantee in one of the answers to your questions.

  • We are a really small team and don’t have the capacity to provide individual feedback, However, after each round we try to update our application guidance - if you wish to reapply.

  • We get approximately 800 to 900 applications a round and now give out 20 grants a time. So currently you have around a 1 in 45 chance of getting selected.

  • You will receive a grant of £1,000, no-strings-attached.

    We ask that you use the money to complete the project you applied for within 6 months of receiving it (though we are open if things change for you or you need to delay). Plus you will have the option to chat to our team for support if you need it.

  • No reports, evaluation forms, or fixed expectations. We also know that sometimes things won’t work out the way you imagined and that’s ok. So we only ask for these things:

    • Feedback on how you found the process of applying

    • A very short update on how you used the grant after six months

    • To see your work as it develops or your realised projects and inspire other people to apply

    • To credit us if and when you share your project publicly

  • Yes! Check out a list of other grants and funding opportunities here.

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