Heritage Projects might include:

• Creation of tangible and intangible resources that focus on heritage in King County, including, but not limited to, books, guides, brochures, research projects, digital projects, oral histories, visual or audio recordings, exhibit displays, and education curriculum.
• Production of special events and programs that highlight heritage in our region including, but not limited to: conferences, workshops, technical assistance programs, apprenticeship or training opportunities, historic tours, field schools, skill demonstrations, and programs that facilitate collaboration between heritage groups and practitioners.
• Creation of resources and programs that explore the themes of the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence as it relates to people and communities in King County. 
• Opportunities for populations underrepresented in mainstream heritage organizations to work firsthand with heritage resources. including communities of color, LGBTQIA+ communities, youth, people with disabilities, and gender variant communities

You can use this grant for:

• Direct project expenses including but not limited to, materials and consumable supplies used for your project, event insurance, transportation, and documentation.
• Publicity and outreach efforts for your project.
• Compensation for the project team, professional consultants, heritage specialists, service providers, trainees, community participants, or staff time if work on the project is outside their regular work duties and payment is beyond their regular compensation structure.
• Rental fee for an event venue or equipment for your project.

You cannot use this grant for:

• Projects that do not focus on heritage in King County as a foundational element.
• Projects that are led or produced primarily by an organization that currently receives a Sustained Support or Launch grant from 4Culture.
• Equipment purchases or capital projects
• General operating support including but not limited to, overhead costs and fees, ongoing rent, utilities, website maintenance, employee benefits or any regular staff salaries.
• Elements of your project completed before funds are awarded: May 27, 2026.
• Fundraising activities or projects for which direct marketing is the primary purpose.
• Religious worship, exercise, prayer, or instruction.
• Programs that are only open to matriculating students.
• Support for services and programs to be provided by the King County Landmarks Commission for land use regulation and archaeological resource management purposes, as described in K.C.C. chapter 20.62 (King County Code 4.42.125H).

For this grant, panelists will use the criteria below to score each application:

• Project impact and public benefit: how your project meets the goals of your organization’s or personal mission and established needs in the community. How well your project helps expand or develop heritage work in King County and shows a potential to raise the visibility of heritage in King County. Your project increases public access to heritage resources and programs, including clear efforts to make them accessible to many ages, disabilities, languages, and communities. Your project provides compelling and feasible public benefit for residents and visitors of King County.
• Quality and qualifications: how well your project activities and planning align with professional standards, best practices, and values of the community served. How well the project maintains connection with the community that the heritage content originates from, especially if the project centers Native cultures or intangible cultural heritage. The qualifications of you and your project team align with the proposed project and its intended impact. Qualifications can be skill, experience, training, or knowledge-based.
• Feasibility: Your ability to complete your project including the proposed public benefits within 24 months of the award date and with a realistic timeline and thoughtful planning. This is demonstrated through the qualifications of the project team, realistic and balanced budget, and details provided in the Project Implementation section.
• Advancing equity: 4Culture’s mission focuses on racial equity and envisions a county where culture is essential and accessible to all. Your project specifically benefits communities of color and/or historically marginalized communities. The project serves or collaborates with members of these communities. This is not an eligibility requirement, but it is one of the factors the panel will consider.

• Free performances, exhibitions, workshops, screenings, or readings.
• Events in the often under-served areas of suburban or rural King County, to low-income, youth and senior groups, individuals with limited physical abilities, recent immigrants, or residents from minority races or ethnicities.
• Free, electronically accessible materials, including literary publications, audio, or video recordings.

• Art Projects: projects that create or share artistic work of any discipline or medium
• Preservation Special Projects: projects that promote preservation of historic places in King County.
• Curiosity Pass: development and implementation of cultural programs and activities that expand learning opportunities in K-12 public schools in King County. 
• Cultural Support Services Projects: development and implementation of programs and initiatives that contribute to quality of life and career development of cultural practitioners.
• For a full list of our programs and artist calls, please see our Grants + Artist Calls page.

• Individual applicants must be at least 18 years old and a resident of King County when you apply and through the completion of your project.
• Organizations, community groups, municipalities, Tribal governments, unincorporated or fiscally sponsored groups must be located and operate within King County.
• Organizations that receive 4Culture’s Sustained Support or Launch grants in 2026 are not eligible to apply. If your or members of your group are staff at a Sustained Support or Launch organization, let us know in your application. Search current awardees here.
• K-12 schools and school districts are not eligible.
• Individual applicants may not represent or apply on behalf of ineligible entities. If you are representing an organization or a group, you must apply as an Organization.
• Current 4Culture staff, 4Culture Board members, and Advisory Committee members may not apply as an individual.
• If you receive funding, individual applicants will need to provide us with your Social Security Number in order to receive payment. Organizations, community groups, and public agencies will need to provide us with an Employer Identification Number (sole proprietorship, LLC, S-Corp, General Partnership, nonprofit, etc.). Your EIN must be registered under the same group name as your 4Culture account. We cannot accept proprietorships under personal names or Social Security Numbers. If you have a fiscal sponsor, let us know in the application.
• Multiple applicants may not apply for the same project.

• Your project must focus primarily on heritage and/or historical themes in King County. Heritage is defined as “the exchange of knowledge and experiences shaped by the past,” and includes local history, ethnic history, Native cultures, folklore and intangible cultural heritage, historic and archaeological resources in King County, heritage field service provider, and stewards of heritage spaces in King County. Historical themes can be about people, memories, places, communities, and events. For further definitions, please see Helping You Succeed section.
• Your project must be accessible and provide public benefit to King County residents and visitors.
• Your project is not led or produced by an ineligible entity.
• Your request amount is between $2,000–$15,000. Requests submitted that are outside of the range are not eligible and will not be considered for funding.
• You may apply to fund the portion of a project that begins on or after May 27, 2026 (the award date). The public benefit of your project must be completed by June 1, 2028.
• Only one application per applicant is accepted.
• If your project involves multiple disciplines—heritage, preservation, and/or arts—it may be eligible for consideration under more than one 4Culture projects funding program. You may request funding for different elements of your project through the separate funding programs, but you must disclose the other 4Culture requests and uses of the funding in your application. Applicants who are interested in applying to multiple programs must contact Megumi Nagata at to discuss your project’s eligibility before applying. Applications that do not meet this requirement may be ruled ineligible.

• “Local history” refers to the examination, documentation, and perpetuation of people, communities, places, and events related to the area now geographically defined as King County.
• “Ethnic history” refers to the examination, documentation, and perpetuation of communities that have immigrated and migrated to King County.
• “Native cultures” refers to the examination, documentation, and perpetuation of the unique customs, beliefs, and practices shared across generations that are rooted in the long-standing histories of communities residing in the United States and territories prior to colonization. Native cultures are often foundational to contemporary identities of individuals and groups. Cultural practices may include: performing arts, recreational activities, knowledge and practices concerning nature and the universe, social practices, ceremonies and practices related to life and death cycles, craftsmanship, oral traditions and expressions, including language as a vehicle of intangible cultural heritage. Work with Native cultures must maintain connection with the cultural source community as a way of minimizing 4Culture’s risk of funding cultural appropriation.
• “Folklore and intangible cultural heritage” refer to the examination, documentation, and perpetuation of traditions of a cultural community that are expressed by members of that group and recognized as reflecting the expectations of that community and its cultural and social identify. Intangible cultural heritage is usually transmitted orally or by imitation; examples include language, literature, music, dance, games, mythology, rituals, and customs. Intangible heritage work must maintain connection with the cultural source community as a way of minimizing 4Culture’s risk of funding cultural appropriation.
• “Historic and archaeological resources” refers to the examination, documentation, and perpetuation of physical objects, sites, and other ephemera that represent histories and cultures of King County and preserved within King County.
• “Heritage Field Service Provider” refers to capacity building services to King County heritage organizations and practitioners to help them grow and thrive. Includes providing capacity support (outreach and marketing, free or reduced cost space, technology and logistical support, etc.) for heritage practitioners, groups, and organizations to run successful heritage programs.
• “Stewards of Heritage Spaces” refers to organizations whose primary purpose is to perpetuate the presence of a cultural community in their culturally significant location in King County or steward a publicly accessible space that is used to facilitate cultural practices, traditions, beliefs, lifeways, arts, crafts, or social institutions of communities that share a common heritage in King County. The space must be rooted in a cultural community’s history, existence, and survival in King County and play an important role in perpetuating the cultural identity of that community.

• Project Description: what do you propose to do in your project? Describe the heritage content or historical themes of your project and the proposed project activities. Why is it important to preserve, identify, document, or explore this heritage content at this time and for the community this project serves? How does this project reflect, build on, or contribute to broader conversations and community efforts to preserve heritage in King County? How did you develop the idea for your project and project activities? If your project has multiple phases and you are seeking funding for a specific phase, please explain which phase of the project this grant will support.
• Project Impact and Public Benefit: describe the intended audience for this project, your history working with this intended audience, and impact or goals for your intended audience. Please explain how this project meets the established needs of the community served or aligns with your organization’s or personal mission. How does your project expand, develop, or raise visibility of heritage in King County? What resources, programs, tangible products, or other types of public benefit will result from this project? How will you provide public access to them as part of the grant requirement? If your project has multiple phases, describe the public benefit of the proposed portion of the project. Please see the guidelines for our definition of public benefit.
• Advancing Equity: explain if this project will benefit specifically communities of color and/or historically marginalized communities in King County. Will your project serve or collaborate with members of these communities? If so, please explain.
• Relevant Expertise, Experience, and Accomplishments: describe the project team who will plan, implement, and manage your project. Cite your and team members’ roles and their qualifications that are relevant and necessary to complete the work successfully, including but not limited to, their experiences, skills, and/or knowledge expertise. If you or members of your team are staff at an organization that receives 4Culture’s Sustained Support or Launch grants, include that here. How will the project team ensure your project aligns with professional standards, best practices, or values of the community this project serves? If you are working with heritage or historical resources from another culture or community, how will you or the project team maintain the connection with the cultural source community? Please share how members of that community are involved in the project.
• Project Implementation: provide a timeline and a work plan for this project. The work plan could include phases for planning, bidding process, fundraising, publicity, execution, public benefit, and evaluation of the intended goals identified in Project Impact section. Describe how you determined the appropriate timeline and work plan for this project. Remember, projects funded through this program should be completed within 24 months of the award date, or by June 1, 2028.

• You or your project site are located outside of the City of Seattle.
• You or your project site are located Seattle but also in a Communities of Opportunity.

Demographic Information

Your profile in our portal must provide demographic information for the current year for yourself and, if you are applying as an organization, for your board and paid staff. You will access the demographic update form through the portal, under “Your Profile” section. You must submit this information by the application due date—March 11, 2026, 5:00 pm PST. We use this information to help us understand how well we are doing in our efforts to reach all communities in King County.

Application Form

The application can be accessed through our portal. Along with Project Budget and optional attachments, answer all narrative questions in the application form: Project Description, Project Impact and Public Benefit, Advancing Equity, Relevant Expertise Experience and Accomplishments, Project Implementation.

Project Budget

Use the budget form embedded in the application to record expected expenses and revenues for the project. The total expenses and revenues must match, including in-kinds in expenses and revenues. In the Budget Notes section, explain the line items and how you intend to use the funds you’re requesting from 4Culture, and how you will scale your project if you receive partial funding. Please refer to “What Heritage Projects Funds” section of the guidelines for eligible and ineligible uses of 4Culture funding. If you are applying for Art Projects or Preservation Projects for the same project, it is required to disclose the amount you are requesting from the other programs (use the “Government” line item in the budget form) and the intended uses of the funds. The funds from Heritage Projects and other programs must be used for different aspects of the project that meet the requirements of each program.

Fiscal Sponsorship

Fiscal sponsorship is a mechanism that enables a 501(c)3 to extend certain benefits of its legal tax-exempt status to groups and projects without the group or project having to file for nonprofit status on its own. If your group or project has a fiscal sponsor, share the fiscal sponsor organization’s name in the application.

Board of Directors (organization and group only)

Provide a list of your organization’s board members, including their service dates, term limits, and their areas of expertise, knowledge, or insights. For project-based groups and community groups, please provide a list of your group’s leadership if it is different from the Relevant Expertise section. If it is the same, simply state so. This is required for organizations and groups only, not for individuals or public agencies.

Attachments (optional)

You may submit up to three attachments to your application. Accepted file types are .doc, .docx, .pdf, .jpg, and .gif. Individual files must be less than 2 MB. To resize files to under 2 MB, you can use free websites like Image Resizer and PDF Resizer. Attachments may include photos, bids, estimates, letters of support from your project partners or communities served by the project, drawings, maps, copies of media coverage, previous research, studies, reports, or other documents to help illustrate your proposal. If your project involves the heritage of another community or if it involves a partner to execute the project, a letter of support is highly encouraged. Please be selective and remember that attachments are optional.