Wainwright Prize

The Wainwright Prize is a literary prize awarded annually for the best works of nature, conservation, and environmental writing. Beginning in 2025 there were six categories: Nature Writing, Conservation Writing, Illustrative Books, Children's Fiction, Children's Non-Fiction, and Children's Picture Books. Each has separate longlists and judging panels. Category winners become eligible to win the overall prizes, the Wainwright Prize Book of the Year and the Wainwright Children's Prize Book of the Year. Nominations are restricted to books published in the UK.

History

The prize celebrates the legacy of British guidebook writer Alfred Wainwright. It was established in 2013 by Frances Lincoln Publishers and The Wainwright Society, in association with the National Trust. Originally the prize was sponsored by Thwaites Brewery, who produced a beer called Wainwright Ale and was later sponsored by Marston's Brewery, who took over Thwaites' production of Wainwright Golden Beer, and thus the prize was sometimes referred to as The Wainwright Golden Beer Book Prize.
In 2020 the prize was no longer sponsored, but was supported by an anonymous benefactor and was "in association with the National Trust". Also in 2020 the prize was split into the Wainwright Prize for UK Nature Writing and the Wainwright Prize for Writing on Global Conservation, with separate longlists and judging panels. In 2021 the Kendal papermakers James Cropper plc became the prize's "headline sponsors" in a three-year agreement. From 2022 until 2024, the prizes were known as the James Cropper Wainwright Prizes. A prize for writing for children was introduced in 2022, with the three prizes newly titled the James Cropper Wainwright Prize for Nature Writing, the James Cropper Wainwright Prize for Writing on Conservation and the James Cropper Wainwright Prize for Children's Writing on Nature and Conservation.
In 2024 it was announced that the prize would be seeking new sponsorship. the prize's partners were: the RSPB, the Wainwright Society, The Wildlife Trusts, the National Trust, Frances Lincoln, World Book Day, National Geographic Kids, and marketing company Agile.
The prize was first awarded in 2014 to Hugh Thomson for his The Green Road into the Trees: A Walk Through England. The winner received a cheque for £5,000. With the introduction of two prizes in 2020 the prize money was shared between the two winners, and in 2022 it was increased to £7,500 to be shared between the three winners. With the prize having been restructured in 2025, the two overall winners received £2,500, while each other category winner received £500, for a total of £7,000 prize money.

Winners and shortlisted titles

In the following tables, the years correspond to the date of the ceremony, rather than when the book was first published. Entries with a blue background and an asterisk next to the writer's name have won the award; those with a pale background are the other nominees on the shortlist.
* Winners

2014–2019: One prize

Year	Author	Book	Publisher	Ref.
2014	*	'	Windmill
2014		Walking Home	Faber & Faber
2014		Badgerlands	Granta
2014		Under Another Sky	Vintage
2014		'	Penguin
2014		Field Notes from a Hidden City	Granta
2015	*	Meadowland	Penguin
2015		Running Free: A Runner's Journey Back to Nature	Yellow Jersey
2015		'	Faber & Faber
2015		Claxton: Field Notes from a Small Planet	Vintage
2015		H is for Hawk	Vintage
2015		Rising Ground: A Search for the Spirit of Place	Granta
2016	*	'	Canongate
2016		Common Ground	Windmill
2016		Landmarks	Penguin
2016		'	John Murray Press
2016		'	Bloomsbury
2016		'	Penguin
2017	*	'	Weidenfeld and Nicolson
2017		Love of Country	Granta
2017		'	William Collins
2017		'	Black Swan
2017		Wild Kingdom	Vintage
2017		'	Black Swan
2017		'	Hodder & Stoughton
2018	*	'	William Collins
2018		'	Headline
2018		Hidden Nature	Hodder & Stoughton
2018		Outskirts	Hodder & Stoughton
2018		'	Canongate
2018	and Jackie Morris	'	Hamish Hamilton
2018		'	Penguin
2019	*	Underland	Hamish Hamilton
2019		Time Song	Vintage
2019		'	Sandstone
2019		Our Place	Vintage
2019		Thinking on My Feet	Octopus Books
2019		Wilding	Picador
2019		Out of the Woods	Weidenfeld and Nicolson

2020–2021: Two prizes

Year	Author	Book	Publisher	Ref.
2020: Global Conservation	*	Rebirding: Restoring Britain's Wildlife	Pelagic Publishing
2020: Global Conservation		What We Need to Do Now	Profile Books
2020: Global Conservation		Irreplaceable	Penguin
2020: Global Conservation		Life Changing: How Humans Are Altering Life on Earth	Bloomsbury Sigma
2020: Global Conservation		Working With Nature	Profile Books
2020: Global Conservation		Sitopia: How Food Can Save the World	Vintage
2020: UK Nature Writing	*	Diary of a Young Naturalist	Ebury Press
2020: UK Nature Writing		Dark, Salt, Clear: Life in a Cornish Fishing Town	Bloomsbury
2020: UK Nature Writing			William Collins
2020: UK Nature Writing		Native: Life in a Vanishing Landscape	Birlinn General
2020: UK Nature Writing		On the Red Hill	Windmill
2020: UK Nature Writing		Wanderland: A Search for Magic in the Landscape	Bloomsbury Wildlife
2020: UK Nature Writing		Dancing with Bees: A Journey Back to Nature	Chelsea Green
2021: Global Conservation	*	Entangled Life	Penguin Random House
2021: Global Conservation		A Life on Our Planet	Ebury Press
2021: Global Conservation		Islands of Abandonment	William Collins
2021: Global Conservation		Fathoms: The World in the Whale	Scribe Publications
2021: Global Conservation		Net Zero: How We Stop Causing Climate Change	William Collins
2021: Global Conservation		Under a White Sky	Vintage
2021: UK Nature Writing	*	English Pastoral: An Inheritance	Penguin
2021: UK Nature Writing		The Screaming Sky	Little Toller Books
2021: UK Nature Writing		Featherhood	Orion
2021: UK Nature Writing		Seed to Dust	Vintage
2021: UK Nature Writing		Thin Places	Canongate
2021: UK Nature Writing		I Belong Here	Bloomsbury Wildlife
2021: UK Nature Writing		The Wild Silence	Penguin