Past Festivals

Winchester Heritage Open Days 2022

Winchester Heritage Open Days’s seventh festival took place from 9th - 18th September during the national period of mourning following the death of Queen Elizabeth II on 8th September. With some events being either cancelled or postponed, the festival went ahead in the spirit of community.

Winchester Heritage Open Days 2021

The sixth Winchester Heritage Open Days has now drawn to a close, but there are still plenty of activities for you, your friends and your family to enjoy online.

Winchester Heritage Open Days 2020

Winchester Heritage Open Days took place 11th to 20th September, and was a little bit different because of Covid-19! However thanks to the enthusiasm and willingness of so many local people and organisations we were able to put on yet another amazing programme of talks, tours, exhibitions and other events for you all to enjoy.

Winchester Heritage Open Days 2019

2019 was an extraordinary year. We celebrated our 4th year organising Winchester Heritage Open Days, nationally they celebrated 25 years and this was the first year we ran for 10 days. Heritage Open Days in 2019 just seemed to get bigger and better.

We had nearly 150 different events in our local programme, many of which took place at multiple times over multiple days. There was so much to do in and around Winchester. We were delighted to see so many favourites return & very excited to introduce some new events too!

Winchester Heritage Open Days 2018

This was the year we really began to grow here in Winchester, thanks to a growing team of volunteers and the brilliant theme of ‘Extraordinary Women’. It was also to be the last year that the festival took place over a weekend, as the following year it expanded to 10 days! Take a look at what we got up to in 2018 by clicking on the button below to access a PDF of the festival programme.

Winchester Heritage Open Days 2017

In 2017 Nicky Gottlieb was joined by Becky Brown behind the scenes, and not only was this website was born but the number of FREE events doubled. If you would like to take a peep at what we got up to in our second year, then do click on the button below to access a PDF of the programme

Winchester Heritage Open Days 2016

In 2015 Heritage Open Days barely existed in Winchester, but this all changed the following year when local resident Nicky Gottlieb decided that HODs should be an integral part of the local cultural calendar. After-all Winchester and the surrounding villages and towns have so much history and heritage to showcase!

Volunteering mostly on her own Nicky, now our festival director and chair of Hampshire History Trust, arranged a programme of over 40 free events in and around the City.