Listed building

A listed building, in the United Kingdom, is one that has been placed on the Statutory List of Buildings of Special Architectural or Historic Interest.

The statutory bodies maintaining the list are Historic England in England; Cadw (The Historic Environment Service of the Welsh Government) in Wales; Historic Scotland in Scotland; and the Northern Ireland Environment Agency (NIEA) in Northern Ireland.

The term has also been used in the Republic of Ireland, where buildings are surveyed for the National Inventory of Architectural Heritage in accordance with the country's obligations under the Granada Convention. However, the preferred term in Ireland is protected structure.

A listed building may not be demolished, extended, or altered without special permission from the local planning authority, which typically consults the relevant central government agency, particularly for significant alterations to the more notable listed buildings. Exemption from secular listed building control is provided for some buildings in current use for worship, but only in cases where the relevant religious organisation operates its own equivalent permissions procedure. Owners of listed buildings are, in some circumstances, compelled to repair and maintain them and can face criminal prosecution if they fail to do so or if they perform unauthorised alterations. The listing procedure allows for buildings to be removed from the list if the listing is shown to be in error.