2025 Honey & Wax Book Collecting Prize Open for Entries
The ninth annual Honey & Wax Book Collecting Prize for an outstanding book collection put together by a woman aged under in the United States is returning for 2025.
The prize, which includes a $1,000 cash award, was founded in 2017 by antiquarian booksellers Heather O’Donnell of Honey & Wax Booksellers and Rebecca Romney of Type Punch Matrix who observed that the women who regularly bought books from them were less likely to call themselves 'collectors' than the men, even when those women had spent years passionately collecting books.
"By creating a platform that celebrates and shares innovative collections created by young women, and providing a financial incentive to those collectors as they work, we aim to encourage a new generation of women collectors," they said in a joint statement.
The contest is open to women book collectors in the United States, aged 30 or younger. The winning collection must have been started by the entrant, and all items in the collection must be owned by her. A collection may include books, manuscripts, and ephemera, and it may be organized by theme, author, illustrator, printing technique, binding style, or another clearly articulated principle. According to the organisers, the winning collection will be more than a reading list of favorite texts, rather a unique group of creatively chosen printed or manuscript objects.
Collections will not be judged on their size or market value, but on originality and success in illuminating the chosen subjects.
2024 winner, national security analyst Elena Wicker, for Military Mania: A Collection of U.S. Military Dictionaries from 1776 to Today, said: “The process of applying for, and then winning, the prize gave me a much greater appreciation of my books as a collection and affirmed my identity as a collector.”
The deadline for submissions is July 1. This year’s winner will be announced in September.
The 2025 Honey & Wax Book Collecting Prize is sponsored by Biblio, Bibliopolis, The Caxton Club, Christie’s, and Ellen A. Michelson.
