About Laurel Miller

Laurel has worked as a consultant fundraiser, evaluator and grant-maker since January 2022. In her first year, she achieved 100% success rate in applications to the National Lottery Heritage Fund working for organisations including South West Coast Path Association, Golden Tree Productions CIC, Yeovil Art Spaces, Take a Part CIC and Dreadnought Southwest. She works for Make Southwest as fundraising consultant securing funding from a range of trusts and grant giving bodies. Her work for South West Museum Development has included training on fundraising, small grants programme evaluation and writing grants assessment materials.

Laurel spent 6 years working at the National Lottery Heritage Fund, leaving in late 2021. She has detailed knowledge of the Fund's priorities, funding requirements and processes with a forensic understanding of what makes a fundable application. 

In a 20-year career in the Heritage Sector, she has specialised in community engagement, diversity and inclusion in archives, museums, and historic sites. She has set up new engagement and learning programmes for 3 organisations: secured funding, conducted audience consultation, and established financially sustainable programmes. Her roles included bid writing, audience consultation, programme management and delivery.

In a volunteer role, she has fundraised £60,000 in 2019 for a community project, managed a team of local COVID volunteers and programmed and delivered local community events.

Laurel is passionate about nature and landscapes, spending a lot of her spare time walking on her beloved Dartmoor. She is very knowledgeable about the challenges facing nature and what can be done to support nature's restoration. She is an active volunteer supporting a local nature project in Devon.

Inclusion and diversity are very important to Laurel who is an active advocate for them throughout her career and work at the Heritage Fund. She has a particular interest in people with Autism, neurodiversity and learning disabilities and is a firm believer in the importance of the co-design approach and giving under-represented audiences not just the space to be heard but also the opportunity to lead.

Laurel has worked extensively in heritage including, industrial, local history, oral history, hidden histories, archaeology, museum and archive collections.

Clients value Laurel's approach which is calm, reasoned, sensible and successful. Her advice is based on her direct experience of working for a major funder and grounded in years of experience working in the heritage sector. Laurel really understands what it is like to work in a small or medium sized organisation with limited resources and capacity to develop funding applications.