Singapore Prize 2024 Winners Announced

The winners of this year’s Singapore Prize, the biennial literary award sponsored by Temasek Foundation, have been announced. The winners are Ali bin Salim, Daryl Qilin Yam, Pan Zheng Lei (Pan Cheng Lui), and rma cureess. Each of the shortlisted authors will receive a cash prize of 1,000 Singapore dollars and book-purchase vouchers worth 50 Singapore dollars. This year, more than 4,000 readers voted in the consumer choice category, roughly twice as many as last year’s cohort of voters.

The winning authors will be able to use the prize money as well as other support and resources to develop their work further. They also get the opportunity to participate in workshops and mentorship programmes with experts from renowned organisations such as the World Economic Forum, New York Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the National Arts Council.

Kishore Mahbubani, NUS Asia Research Institute distinguished professor and Singapore Prize founding director, says that “The best way to understand nations is to see them as imaginative communities. A shared imagination is a critical glue holding societies together.”

This year, the prize is being co-organised by WAF and Inside with the support of partners from several sectors, including Temasek and the National Arts Council. This is in line with the prize’s goal to showcase innovative design projects from across the world that address major global issues, such as tackling climate emergencies and building community resilience.

For the first time, the prize will recognise projects that are scaled and replicable by others globally. This will be a key focus in the selection process as the winning project should be a catalyst for action that can transform the future of our planet. The project must be sustainable and scalable, using existing technologies that will be easily replicated.

Winners will be able to access an incubation fund from the prize’s partner Temasek Foundation, and connect with a range of industry leaders, including investors and business partners, to take their ideas to the next level. The winning projects will also be featured in the 2024 edition of WAF and Inside, a publication that celebrates leading Asian designers and innovators.

The judging panel will include an international and diverse group of leading architects, designers, journalists, and thought leaders. Jury members already confirmed for this year’s event include Kelley Cheng, Sanjay Puri, Emre Arolat, Mariana Simas, Jeremy Hiekman, Mario Cucinella, and Sonali Rastogi. The full judging panel will be announced shortly.