Turn to the business pages of any national newspaper and rarely a day passes without yet another story about the high street's struggles. Boarded up shops have become proxies for the left-behind places so often talked about by politicians.

Earlier this month, culture secretary Nicky Morgan announced £95m to revive 69 urban centres with a strong ‘heritage' focus. While the scope for this is broad, examples given for how to spend the money include restoring historic town and city centre buildings and old shop fronts.