Life Awards in Lifestyle, Arts and Culture 2025
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The Straits Times Life section gives out 17 awards to the biggest coups – and gaffes – in entertainment, arts, style, travel, food and culture this year.
PHOTOS: JASON QUAH, SCOTT DUNN, NETFLIX, LIANHE ZAOBAO, HEDY KHOO
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SINGAPORE – The Straits Times Life section gives out 17 awards to the biggest coups – and gaffes – in entertainment, arts, style, travel, food and culture this year.
The So Long, Thanks For Everything Award goes to The Projector, Cathay and more
The Projector’s farewell party in August. The indie cinema was founded in 2014.
PHOTO: PRASHANT SOMOSUNDRAM
2025 was the year of the cinema-pocalyse. Three institutions imploded, brought down by changing consumer habits, Hollywood labour action and a host of other woes.
Indie cinema The Projector entered into voluntary liquidation in August. Less than two weeks later, in September, storied cinema chain Cathay Cineplexes also closed its doors for good.
Earlier in 2025, Filmgarde closed its last cinema at Leisure Park Kallang.
What makes these endings award-worthy is the drama. Like all good dramas, it starts with a compelling backstory.
The Do IT First, Worry Later Award goes to Jack Neo, AI Pioneer
I Want To Be Boss stars (from left) Jack Neo, Zoen Tay and Henry Thia. Artificial intelligence was used by Neo to create the movie’s songs.
PHOTO: GOLDEN VILLAGE
Film-maker Jack Neo is a trailblazer, and trailblazers do not become who they are by listening to critics.
Artificial intelligence (AI) has many haters because critics see it as a way for the untalented to crank out slop. But for Neo, where others saw junk, he saw opportunity.
That is why he gets this award: After a lengthy career as one of Singapore’s most flamed-on yet successful creators, he has not just become critic-proof, but also slop-proof.
The Foetal Consequences Award goes to the Squid Game baby
Jo Yu-ri plays Kim Jun-hee, who gives birth in Squid Game’s third and final season.
PHOTOS: NETFLIX
The good news is that no real babies were harmed in Netflix’s South Korean series Squid Game (2021 to 2025) over its third and final season. The bad news: the digital-animatronic baby looked like it was made for a display at a wax museum.
Fans of the deathmatch thriller suspected – correctly, as it turned out – that Player 222, Kim Jun-hee (Jo Yu-ri), would give birth during the season and the child would be central to the season’s arc.
In June, the new season dropped, as did Jun-hee’s baby. While most were happy with the way the story unfolded, they were much less pleased with the newborn, which looked off in the way that most bad computer graphics look off.
The Corporate Team-Building Exercise Award goes to the Coldplay Kisscam Couple
Ms Kristin Cabot and Mr Andy Byron were caught snuggling on camera before they decoupled abruptly when they realised they were on the stadium's big screen.
PHOTO: INSTAAGRAACE/TIKTOK
The next time you call K-dramas cheesy and unrealistic, consider this award winner.
Its synopsis would read like this: She was his employee. He was a rich, handsome chief executive. Their paths crossed and – despite both being married – her heart wanted what it wanted, and so did his.
But it all fell apart at a concert when a pop star’s casual moment of fun created a moment of physical comedy that would break not just the internet, but also careers and marriages.
The Best K-pop Group Award goes to Huntrix from KPop Demon Hunters
Fictional girl group Huntrix from the Netflix movie Kpop Demon Hunters (2025). Their song Golden is in the running for four Grammy Awards.
PHOTO: NETFLIX
If you have school-going children, chances are, they have attended at least one birthday party themed around the hit Netflix film KPop Demon Hunters (2025) this year. Maybe more.
Pink and lavender wigs? Check. Midriff-baring tops and knee-high boots? Check. Swords, polearms and throwing knives? Well, probably blunt toy substitutes.
That is how big the animated musical fantasy film, released in June, became in 2025.
The Best Side-Turned-Main Hustle Award goes to live selling
Homemaker Emily Tan conducts daily morning live streams, before going about her mum duties.
ST PHOTO: LIM YAOHUI
If you own a smartphone, chances are, you would have bought something from a live stream in 2025.
From dental tablets to televisions, all manner of commodities has been hawked over the booming medium of live-selling, which some may argue reached a fever pitch in 2025.
Once the terrain of unashamed aunties and the S-Hook Ah Lian, live streams had a slower start in Singapore.
They were utilised mostly on Facebook and Instagram around the time of the Covid-19 pandemic, with a leisurely pace of sales and conversions. And then came TikTok.
The Most Wicked Non-Singaporean To Put Singapore On The Map Award goes to Johnson Wen
Australian national Johnson Wen attacked American actress and pop star Ariana Grande in Singapore at the Asia premiere of the movie sequel Wicked: For Good.
ST PHOTO: KELVIN CHNG
Just as many thought 2025 was coming to a peaceful end, Singapore found itself in the unpleasant situation of making global headlines – for the wrong reasons.
Australian Johnson Wen, 26, became a household name here in mid-November, after he attacked American actress and pop star Ariana Grande in Singapore at the Asia premiere of the movie sequel Wicked: For Good.
At the ticketed yellow carpet event held at Universal Studios Singapore on Nov 13, the Australian citizen jumped the barricade and rushed towards Grande, flinging his arm roughly around her.
The Most Overused Phrase Of The Year Award goes to ‘hidden gem’
Once known as a hidden gem, tourists have flocked to the city of Dali in China’s Yunnan province in recent years for its panoramic natural landscapes and ancient towns.
PHOTO: SCOTT DUNN
In recognition of a phrase that has managed to appear everywhere – in stories, social media posts, travel pitches and beyond – the title of Overused Phrase of the Year (Travel) goes to the indefatigable, ever-elastic and eternally circulating expression: Hidden Gem.
Few terms have travelled as widely or persistently. Once, perhaps, it meant a quiet cove known only to locals or a small restaurant without a signboard.
But the phrase has become a paradox of sorts. A newly discovered place that has been labelled as one is, more often than not, meant for broadcast, quickly turning a secret into universal knowledge.
The Greatest Self-implosion Award goes to Singapore bag brand Aupen
Aupen founder Nicholas Tan published his comments about Ipos amid a potential trademark dispute in the US between his handbag brand Aupen and Target.
PHOTOS: AUPEN
It could have been a publicity coup. Instead, it ended in a Pofma order.
Home-grown handbag brand Aupen had public sympathy on its side when news first broke of American mega-chain Target’s intention to oppose its trademark registration application in the United States.
But Aupen founder Nicholas Tan might have stretched the David versus Goliath plot too far when, in comments to the press and eager Instagram mob, he pitched the brewing registry-level dispute as a full-blown lawsuit.
The Great ‘Bust’ Up Award goes to SG60 art exhibitions
Culture Story founder Chong Huai Seng (right) and curator Kwok Kian Chow pictured with the Lee Kuan Yew bust and a work by Ming Wong.
ST PHOTO: JASON QUAH
Received historical narratives in Singapore have been undergoing recalibration in recent years, thanks to decolonising and declassifying of information such as pioneer leader Goh Keng Swee’s Albatross file.
In less dramatic fashion, art exhibitions in 2025 also sought to retell Singapore’s story, fitting for a year celebrating the Republic’s 60th anniversary.
The most memorable exhibition was one centring the “bust” of this eponymous award, a loving tribute by private collector Chong Huai Seng that may come to exemplify a new approach to history – individual and personal.
In his Artist’s Proof: Singapore At 60, he used a rare “melancholic” bust of founding Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew by British sculptor Sydney Harpley as a bridgehead to critique ideas of Singapore art.
The Library Of Alexandria Award goes to NUS Libraries’ ‘operational lapse’
The National University of Singapore destroyed 500 books from Yale-NUS College Library in what it called an “operational lapse”.
PHOTO: LIANHE ZAOBAO
What ancient fire destroyed the Library of Alexandria continues to be the stuff of legends, and its loss has been mourned throughout the ages. Did the Roman general Julius Caesar set the temple of knowledge on fire during a civil war? Did Arab invaders burn scrolls and artefacts to use as fuel for the city’s bath houses?
When the National University of Singapore (NUS) destroyed 500 books from Yale-NUS College Library, the university’s apology and explanation for its destruction was more straightforward – there was an “operational lapse”. If not for an outcry from students on May 20, that lapse might have leapt 18 times to the disposal of 9,000 books.
The Look Back In Wonder Award goes to Singapore theatre’s history plays
Tickets to Wild Rice’s third re-run of Hotel sold out swiftly.
PHOTO: WILD RICE
Has SG60 thrown up some of the most iconic contemporary Singapore history plays? This was the question posed by The Straits Times when previewing a slate of 25 must-watch plays in 2025.
After all, anniversaries often trigger a look back into the past – be it a kitschy and sentimental callback to familiar narratives, an upending of historical cliches or the unearthing of buried stories. That Singapore theatre has staged a bumper crop of history plays in the year of SG60 is no coincidence, as the scene has often positioned itself as a corrective to the narrative certainties of The Singapore Story.
The Buy Now, Pay Later Award goes to the SG Culture Pass initiative
Writer Ken Liu delivering a keynote at the Singapore Writers Festival 2025, the first festival to qualify for Culture Pass.
PHOTO: MOONRISE STUDIO
Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) services have been accused of encouraging indiscriminate consumption and spendthrift habits among users.
But the Government is leveraging the concept for a good cause: encouraging Singaporeans to spend on home-grown arts and heritage experiences, thereby supporting local artists.
The SG Culture Pass initiative, announced in Parliament as part of Budget 2025, gives each Singaporean aged 18 and above $100 to spend on performances and exhibitions. Some $300 million has been allotted to the initiative, spread over three years.
The I Quit! Just Kidding Award goes to the return-to-office backlash that never materialised
Return-to-office mandates have been rolled out across the board, with companies such as Amazon and Grab requiring staff to be in office five days a week.
ST PHOTO: GIN TAY
If 2024 was the peak of flexible work frenzy, 2025 was the year that workers quietly fell back in line.
A 2024 Randstad Singapore survey found that about half (49 per cent) of the 759 Singapore-based workers polled would consider quitting their jobs if asked to spend more time in the office. This sentiment was most pronounced among Gen Z workers, with 69 per cent of those polled making that stand.
That same year, the Tripartite Guidelines on Flexible Work Arrangement Requests were introduced, calling for employers to fairly consider flexible work arrangements from December 2024.
By 2025, the enthusiasm for working from home appears to have receded.
The Best Disappearing Act Award goes to the Singapore diner
American egg sandwich chain Eggslut shut its store at Scotts Square on Feb 28 after earlier closing a Suntec City outlet in 2024, marking its exit from Singapore.
PHOTO: EGGSLUT
Magician Criss Angel could not have done a better job. Neither could David Blaine, David Copperfield nor, indeed, the original escapologist, Harry Houdini.
In the heady days post-Covid-19 pandemic, diners flooded restaurants. They ordered feasts and bottles of wine, and dined out with a vengeance after two-plus years of forced hibernation.
Then, in 2024, they started disappearing. Borders were opening up. Diners here suddenly had use for their wings, aided by the strong Singapore dollar.
In 2025, the silence became deafening.
The Most Likely To Replace Water As The Staple Liquid Award goes to matcha
Strawberry Matcha, like the version served at home cafe Brew With Grace, has taken Singapore by storm in 2025.
ST PHOTO: HEDY KHOO
A commonly circulated myth on the internet, fuelled by Hollywood’s depiction of wine-slinging nobles gathered around a feast, is that the people of the Middle Ages consumed alcohol instead of water.
So, too, might future generations look back on the social media relics of this era and conclude that its population must have survived on matcha alone.
These days, if you try to squeeze water from a rock, you will probably get a trickle of green instead, followed by a strawberry or two. To say matcha is everywhere might well be an understatement. It can be found at home, cafes, vending machines, on tap and more.
The Happy Retirement Award goes to piggy bank
Singapore’s piggy banks are increasingly collecting dust instead of coins, as more kids embrace cashless payments.
PHOTO: PIXABAY
The piggy bank has been the emblem of financial literacy of childhood past. It serves as a kid’s first bank – a trusted guardian of his or her precious coin stash at home – before setting foot into a real bank, which can be an intimidating experience with its armed guards.
The humble piggy bank deserves a standing ovation for its significant contribution to instilling healthy money habits in children.
