Aficionado Award

Exceptional publishing initiatives and collaborations

The first international award to promote individuals, organisations and initiatives that are making a lasting difference in the publishing industry.

The AFICIONADO AWARD is a unique cooperation between its founding members, the Aficionado Community of international publishing professionals, Frankfurter Buchmesse and the Salone Internazionale del Libro di Torino. It was launched to recognise outstanding projects and to network, support and promote the personalities behind them.

Are you part of the publishing industry and would like to become a member of the Aficionado Community? Then get in touch via e-mail(opens in a new window): In future, you will receive invitations to Aficionado events and to participate in voting on future award winners.

2025 winners & nominees

Three outstanding projects that have been shortlisted for the Aficionado Award 2025:

La Disparition(opens in a new window) (Marseille) represented by Annabelle Perrin: A unique epistolary media project chronicling what is vanishing from our world
Seagull Books(opens in a new window) (Calcutta), represented by Sunandini Banerjee, merges world-class literature with cultural and educational engagement.
zoralit(opens in a new window) (Berlin), represented by Laura Weber: A cooperative of literary professionals who develop joint projects and advancing fair, sustainable, and inclusive publishing

The nominees presented their inspiring work on 14 May 2025 at the Salone Internazionale del Libro in Turin and the winner Seagull Books was chosen by members of the Aficionado Award community following a live session and an open discussion.

The award ceremony with Seagull Books represented by Naveen Kishore (Publisher) and Sunandini Banerjee (Senior Editor and Graphic Designer) will take place on Thursday, October 16 at 11 am CEST at the Frankfurt International Stage.

2025 Shortlist

Aficionado Awards 2025

The Aficionado Award Ceremony 2025

The Aficionado Award Ceremony will return on Thursday, 16 October from 11:00 –11:30 (CEST) on the Frankfurt International Stage at Frankfurter Buchmesse. Erin Cox will host the event once again, and Camilla Cottafavi (Feltrinelli Education) will speak on behalf of the Aficionado community.

To the event

2024 Winner & Shortlist

The 2024 Aficionado Award was presented to Rita Mattar, co-founder of the poetry subscription platform Circulo de Poemas(opens in a new window), an imprint of Fósforo Editora. Rita Mattar accepted the award on behalf of the founding team at an award ceremony on the Frankfurter International Stage. The 2024 shortlistees were Alba Donati for her bookshop La libreria sopra la Penna(opens in a new window) in a tiny Tuscan village and its associated literature festival as well as Frederike Doppenberg for her magazine Fifth Wave(opens in a new window) which provides a forum for independent Russian authors.

Panel discussion and award ceremony at #fbm24

Aficionado Award at Frankfurter Buchmesse 2024

Aficionado Award Panel Frankfurter Buchmesse 2024

Aficionado Award Foto Shoot Frankfurter Buchmesse 2024

2023 Winner & Shortlist

The very first winner of the Aficionado Award was the Aké Arts and Book Festival in 2023. The unique festival was founded by Lola Shoneyin in 2013. Over the last decade, Aké has excelled at establishing a sense of community between participating authors while creating important connections with the local audience in Abeokuta, Lagos State. One of the festival’s explicit aims is to promote literacy, especially among a younger audience. To date, Aké has brought together writers, artists, poets and filmmakers from 29 African countries.

The book magazine The Passenger and the international literary cooperation Meridian Czernowitz were shortlisted for the award in 2023.

Aficionado Award Gewinnerin 2023 Lola Shoneyin auf der International Stage

2023 Aficionado Award Ceremony with winner Lola Shoneyin

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