A tremendous trio of projects from Wales are appealing for votes after reaching the finals of the 25^th Birthday National Lottery Awards – the annual search for the UK’s favourite National Lottery-funded projects.

[aoa id=”1″]Llanrumney Phoenix Amateur Boxing Club in Cardiff, St Fagans National Museum of History and the Behind the Label project beat off stiff competition from more than 700 organisations to reach the public voting stage in this year’s Awards, which celebrate the inspirational people and projects who have done extraordinary things with the help of National Lottery funding[/aoa]

Each award winner will each get a £10,000 cash prize, an iconic National Lottery Awards trophy and attend a star-studded glitzy awards ceremony to be broadcast on BBC One in November.

Opened in 2008, Llanrumney Phoenix Amateur Boxing Club is a boxing club and community hub in a deprived area of Cardiff. The club provides a safe space for children, young people and adults to use the gym, get fit and improve their mental well-being as well as make new friends. They need your vote to be crowned the Best Sport project in the UK.

St Fagans National Museum of History is Wales’ largest and most popular heritage attraction and one of Europe’s leading open air museums. The Museum, which celebrated its 70th birthday last year with a major National Lottery funded makeover, showcases how the people of Wales have lived – from the world of a 230,000 year old Neanderthal child to present day. St Fagans is shortlisted in the Best Heritage Project category

The Behind the Label project run by the Theatre Versus Oppression charity, will compete to be named Best Culture, Arts and Film Project in the UK. Behind the Label is a creative project for people who have experienced homelessness and low self-esteem to share life experiences which culminates in an alternative theatre performance. This results in an incredibly honest, raw and eye-opening performance project that examines the conflict and behaviours of people who have experienced homelessness first-hand.

Jonathan Tuchner, from the National Lottery, added: “It’s thanks to National Lottery players, who raise more than £30 million each week for good causes, that brilliant projects like those in the finals of the National Lottery Awards are possible.

“These organisations are doing an incredible job in their local community and the work they do is hugely impressive. They thoroughly deserve to be in the finals of the 25^th Birthday National Lottery Awards and with your support they could be winners.”

To vote for Llanrumney Phoenix Boxing Club go to lotterygoodcauses.org.uk/awards OR use the hashtag #NLALlanrumneyBoxingon twitter
To vote for St Fagans National Museum of History go to lotterygoodcauses.org.uk/awards OR use the hashtag #NLAStFagans on twitter.
To vote for Behind the Label go to lotterygoodcauses.org.uk/awards OR use the hashtag #NLABehindtheLabel on twitter

To vote go to lotterygoodcauses.org.uk/awards. You can also follow the campaign on Twitter: hashtag #NLAwards. Voting runs from 9am on 24 July until midnight on 21 August.

The award categories reflect the main areas of National Lottery funding: heritage, sport, arts, culture and film, community and charity, sporting legend which will be decided by a public vote alongside lifetime achievement, young hero, special recognition, and twelve local legend awards, which will be selected by a panel made up of representatives from the National Lottery family.

The first National Lottery draw took place on 19 November 1994. The 25^th birthday is a moment to celebrate the extraordinary impact The National Lottery has had on the UK and, most importantly, to say thank you to National Lottery players for contributing tens of millions of pounds every week to good causes.