Announcing the What's On Reading Awards 2026!

After last year’s inaugural “Cultural Champions”, we’re back for a second year, with a new name – the What’s On Reading Awards for arts, culture and heritage!

Once again, we want to recognise those within our town’s arts, culture and heritage community who have done great things in the past year – and nominations are now open! 

This year there are 11 categories, and we invite you to nominate the people, places and events that made a mark, made a difference, and made our town such a vibrant cultural space during 2025.

The categories are:

• Event of the Year – A festival, a gig, a show… whatever! Your pick for the best single event of 2025.
• Creative Skills Award – Celebrating the people, places and projects that are all about giving back, sharing skills and nurturing talent for future success, from venues and organisations that teach classes and workshops, to events that support personal and professional growth.
• Creative Wellbeing Award – Celebrating those creative activities that help people feel better in their body and mind, or which support preventative action and behaviours to aid mental and physical wellbeing.
• Cultural Ambassador Award – An event, organisation, individual or venue that represents Reading on a wider stage, or that promotes recognition of Reading as a cultural destination. This could be an event that brings out-of-town audiences to Reading, or a local organisation that has flown the flag on a national stage.
• Cultural Partnership Award – An event or project where two or more local organisations, individuals or venues have joined up to create something wonderful. This could be partnerships within the cultural sector or outside of that, such as with community groups or local businesses.
• Diversity Award – An event, activity, person, group or place that has delivered significant work for or with under-represented groups, including recognition for accessibility within arts, culture and heritage.
• Film & Screen Award – Celebrates a person, independent film, short production, local cinema initiative, outdoor screening series, or film-based community project that has significantly enriched Reading’s film culture in the past year.
• Heritage Award – Recognising the people and places dedicated to preserving Reading’s cultural and natural heritage, ensuring it is celebrated, understood, and shared with future generations. This could be a museum or heritage site, an organisation that celebrates local history, or an individual who lives and loves Reading’s past.
• One To Watch Award – Recognising the unsung heroes who have made bold steps in the past year. This could be a newcomer to the cultural scene, an innovator who’s done something truly different, or a stalwart of the scene quietly doing things that more people should be paying attention to.
• Sustainability Award – Recognising those who have delivered work sustainably or set sustainability targets within the events they have delivered, or those projects that integrate cultural expression with environmental awareness.
• Youth Culture Award – Celebrating youth involvement in cultural initiatives and the importance of arts and culture within education. This could range from young individuals or groups, to youth-focused projects or organisations, to someone that has delivered an educational project, to a school that has delivered something within the cultural sphere. 

We invite our cultural community to nominate themselves and their events. But we also invite the people of Reading – without whom these events could not take place – to nominate the events, venues and organisations that you enjoyed so much throughout the past year using the form on this page. But don’t just tell us who you want to win – tell us why your nominee deserves to take home that particular award for their 2025 efforts. 

You can nominate as many different people and places as you like, so do let us know what you’ve achieved, experienced and, crucially, enjoyed last year! And do spread the word with your friends and followers so we can get as many nominations as possible, using the hashtag #WoRAwards on social media.

Nominations will close at midnight on Sunday 8 February, after which we will have the unenviable task of coming up with a shortlist of finalists for each category. A panel of independent experts will then decide the winners, with the exception of the “Event of the Year” category – that will go out to the people of Reading to decide! 

The awards will then be given out at a ceremony-party at the end of March… details coming soon.

So, whether you’ve been putting on events or enjoying them in the past year, let us know what, who and where you think deserves a What’s On Reading Award and get nominating!