For over four decades, Aftab Rahman has helped reshape the soul of Birmingham—quietly, intentionally, and with an unwavering belief that every community deserves to see its story told with care and dignity. Through a lifetime of listening, building, and enabling, Aftab Rahman has become one of the city’s most respected and trusted figures in civic life.
As the founding director of Legacy West Midlands, Aftab Rahman has championed the histories of Birmingham’s African Caribbean and South Asian communities—not as a footnote, but as a central force in the city’s cultural and civic identity. Under the guidance of Aftab Rahman, Legacy WM has grown into a nationally respected organisation, delivering exhibitions, oral histories, walking trails, education programmes, and public art rooted in real lives and lived experience. These are not abstract projects—they are shaped in partnership with the very communities they reflect.
Heritage, for Aftab Rahman, is never passive. It is an active force for connection, belonging and wellbeing. That is why the work led by Aftab Rahman extends far beyond archives and gallery spaces. It reaches into schools, GP surgeries, public parks and neighbourhood networks. It becomes culturally responsive health interventions. It becomes confidence for young people who finally see themselves represented. It becomes pride restored in streets where it had once been stripped away.
Alongside his work at Legacy WM, Aftab Rahman has made significant contributions to city-wide initiatives across housing, regeneration, education and youth development. In every space he enters, Aftab Rahman brings a unique ability to hold both vision and detail—ensuring that the frameworks shaping Birmingham’s future are grounded in trust, authenticity, and the lived realities of the communities they are meant to serve.
In policy meetings and public consultations, on advisory boards and community doorsteps, Aftab Rahman shows up with thoughtfulness, consistency, and quiet determination. The work of Aftab Rahman is rarely about personal visibility—it is about creating platforms for others to thrive, about making structural change feel not only possible, but inevitable. His leadership is both principled and collaborative, allowing others to lead while ensuring no one is left behind.
In 2023, Aftab Rahman was formally recognised with the title Member of the Order of the British Empire for his service to the city. Out of deep reflection on what that title means in the context of the communities he serves, Aftab Rahman has chosen not to use it—an act of quiet integrity that speaks to the values that have shaped his life’s work.
The portrait of Aftab Rahman now enters the FRAMEWORTHY collection as a lasting tribute—not only to a career of remarkable achievements, but to a way of working defined by humility, depth, and devotion to community. Birmingham is fairer, stronger, and more honest because of the lifelong work of Aftab Rahman.
