The Heritage Lottery Fund has confirmed its award of £14.9m for Phase Two of the Natural History Centre’s Darwin Centre.

The centre is the final stage in a two-phase development of the museum’s Life Sciences complex, which aims to involve the public in research projects and allow better interaction with the collection of natural history specimens.

Sir Neil Chalmers, director of the museum, said the award is a significant step forward to making Darwin Centre Phase Two a reality.

The announcement brings the total amount raised so far to over £32m. The museum is campaigning to raise the necessary funds to complete the project, with a projected finishing date of 2007/8.

Darwin Centre Phase One was opened in October 2002 and gives visitors direct access to the museum’s scientists. The second phase will accommodate the departments of Botany and Entomology and hopes to reach larger audiences. Details: www.nhm.ac.uk

The grant was part of a £90m aid package announced by the HLF, which included £11.5m to ensure the controversial Madonna of the Pinks painting at the National Gallery will now become part of the permanent collection.

St Martin-in the-Fields, the UK’s most visited church, has also received a grant of over £13m for a programme of restoration work, as part of a new HLF package of funds totalling £90m, awarded to various institutions across the country.

“Today’s awards illustrate the range and quality of proposals coming to us while highlighting the continued need for our funds to protect our nation’s most treasured possessions. They also illustrate how dependent the nation’s heritage has become on lottery money,” said Forgan.

Other awards were: £9.47m to London’s Transport Museum to enable it to increase the number of items on show; £7.14m to the Royal Observatory, Greenwich site to create more gallery space, full disabled access and education facilities; £3.49m to help save Kibble Palace curvilinear greenhouse in Glasgow; £10.35m to Wentworth Castle to enable it to become a major tourist attraction; £373,500 to the Woodland Trust to set up a programme of “nature detectives” to record wildlife information; £3.3m for new storage facilities for the Severn Valley’s steam locomotives; £2.13m to Brading Roman Villa on the Isle of Wight to restore the site; £3.7m to the Bethnal Green Museum of Childhood in London for redevelopment; £4.9m for a programme of restoration works for London’s Bushy; £2m for an extension to be built at the North of England Open Air Museum and Tyne and Wear Museums and £2.37m to restore St George’s church in London’s Bloomsbury. Details: www.hlf.org.uk