Nominations open for Apila First Impression Award

The publishing house Apila Ediciones, in collaboration with the School of Design of Aragón and with the support of the Zaragoza City Council, has announced the Apila’s First Impression Award 2025, the thirteenth edition of an International Illustrated Children’s Book competition aimed at strengthening graphic and literary creation by supporting illustrators who have not yet published any books.

Objective

• To promote the production of children’s picture books by illustrators with no previous published works.

Funding Information 

• The award will consist of the signing of a professional contract with Apila Ediciones for the publication of the selected work, which will include the payment to the author(s) of €4,000, equivalent to 10% of the value of the first print run of the book, as well as the dissemination and international distribution of the book. In the event that the rights of the project are shared between writer and illustrator, the percentage of 10% will be divided between them according to the prior agreement reached by both.
• The award will be granted to one project only.

Eligibility Criteria

• All illustrators who wish to participate, of any nationality, over 18 years old, may enter this award without any limitation on the number of projects. A necessary condition for participation is not having any published children’s book with an ISBN until June 14, 2024. However, those who have one or more self-published books with an ISBN may participate, provided that these books were not published through a publishing house or editorial services company. In cases where the project is a collaboration (text by one person and illustrations by another), the condition of not having any published books applies exclusively to the illustrator. Additionally, the rights to the submitted works must be free of commitments to third parties.
• The works submitted, written in Spanish or English, may be original or adaptations of stories free of copyright.

Judging Criteria

• The publisher of Apila Ediciones will appoint a panel of judges, which will be made up of a member of Apila Ediciones, a lecturer in Artistic Drawing and Colour at the Aragon School of Design and two prominent personalities in the field of education, design and/or communication. The panel may resolve any question that arises and is not clarified in these rules. It will also not take into consideration those works that do not comply with these rules, and may leave the award void.

Application Requirements

• The projects may have any format, but may not exceed 40 pages (20 double pages), including legal pages (credits page and title page) and flyleaves. The cover: front cover, spine and back cover are not included in the 40 pages of the book.
• To avoid postal mailings, entrants should submit the following files by e-mail, indicating in the header of the e-mail message, “LAST NAME_FIRST NAME_FIRST_PRINTING”:
  • A PDF file (maximum 15 megabytes) of the finished book or, failing that, of the layout of the book with a minimum of five finished double-page spreads and the rest sketched. The file must be named indicating the surname and first name of the illustrator plus the word “LAST NAME_FIRST NAME _BOOK”.
  • A text or PDF file indicating:
    • Email address, nationality, postal address, telephone number and (optional) website, Facebook, Instagram, blog or any profile of the illustrator. The file must be named indicating the illustrator’s surname and first name plus the word “LAST NAME_FIRST NAME_ DATA”.
  • A text or PDF file that includes the illustrator’s full name, signed with the following text:
    • I, illustrator of this project applying for the Apila First Impression Award, hereby declare that I have not previously published any book with an ISBN before June 14, 2024. The file must be named with the illustrator’s last name and first name followed by the word SIGNATURE: “LASTNAME_FIRSTNAME_SIGNATURE”.

For more information, visit Apila Ediciones.