The European Central Bank (ECB) is preparing to change the design of euro notes, abandoning the historically known “windows and bridges” theme that has inhabited European wallets for the past 21 years, Politico reports.
The current design will be replaced by one of seven ideas proposed by the ECB, covering nature motifs such as birds and rivers, visions of Europe’s future, and common European values.
The ECB will submit the new designs to the evaluation of the Eurozone society,
and it will be possible to express the opinion on the ECB’s website by the end of August. Focus groups are also planned to ensure that views from all regions of the Eurozone are represented. However, the survey faced a pretty poor start, when the website where it can be found became unavailable almost immediately. ECB President Christine Lagarde wrote on Twitter that technical problems had been detected.
Fabio Panetta, a member of the bank’s executive board, said that the bank is working on a new series of high-tech banknotes to reduce the number of counterfeits and reduce the impact on the environment. He said: “We are committed to cash and to ensuring that paying with public money is always an option.”
Despite the opportunity to participate in the survey, the public won’t make a final decision.
It will be carried out by the Governing Council of the ECB in 2024.
Six of the seven design proposals were created by the Theme Advisory Group (TGA), which consists of experts selected by the ECB in December 2021, and the design was chosen from 29 initially submitted options. The bank’s board then decided to add another option – “European culture” – to strengthen the European identity. TGA was given the task of creating a design for each motif, highlighting its purpose and motivation.
The group must work especially carefully to avoid offending national feelings when choosing subjects or persons to portray. Thus, natural motifs, such as rivers or birds, are chosen to symbolize the absence of borders and the connection of European countries.
The birds remained behind the line in the first euro note design competition in 2002. Although neither eagles nor doves can be found on the banknotes, the 50-euro banknote leaves room for an owl, the bird Lagarde compared herself to in her second press conference.
The offered themes promise to be a challenge for designers.
For example, on the topic “European values mirrored in nature”, the ECB has recognized that expressing these abstract, yet extremely important concepts will require a magical touch to visualize them.
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