Future euro banknote design proposals | Hacker News Reader

Future euro banknote design proposals

ecb.europa.eu

281 pointsrobin_reala326 comments

https://www.ecb.europa.eu/euro/banknotes/future_banknotes/ht...

I find the bridges to be rather brilliant, as they're distinctly European without being placeable (until Spijkenisse got feeling[1]).

The least historical governmental buildings in Europe seems like an awful choice by contrast: They're tied to a physical location in western Europe that most of us have little to no connection to. They're boring (which is not a criticism of the buildings, they're functional which is their purpose, but I'd rather not see them on coinage).

For a similar reason, the portraits are also just... fine. Greek, German, Polish-French, Spaniard, Italian, and Austrian. It's much more diverse than the buildings, but the Balkans, Nordics (including Latvia and Estonia), Benelux, and other smaller states remain unrepresented. Of course, changing anyone out would leave another unrepresented (though the obverse and reverse could both be used in harmony, why does the reverse have to be nondescript?).

If we're going for people, one thing I really like about the Swedish bills is that the person on the lowest denomination is specifically chosen to have an icon for children: Currently Astrid Lindgren and previously Selma Lagerlöf made the 20 krona bill distinctly "for the children". The choice of Bertha von Suttner for the highest denomination is one that I agree with -- and also aligned with the Swedish bank notes where the equivalent is held by Dag Hammarskjöld. Both ECB and Riksbanken chose a person best known for their pursuit of peace and unity of humankind.

Still, the beauty of the bridges is that they're European, not French or German.

All that aside, I'd hope for F or J stylistically. There's too much vectorization happening on most of the others. It feels like the others won't stand the test of time. G and C already feels ten years out of date imo.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eurobridges_Spijkenisse

As I mentioned elsewhere, it's kinda strange they didn't learn the lesson from Euro coins and did multiple versions of each banknote to cover and represent every member state with at least one person.

With the amount of security mechanisms in a banknote that have to be tailed to each design, I would assume that making that many variants would be financially irresponsible.

Would actually cost more than something like having 27 translators in each major meeting?

No, just leave a blank space in the middle that has nothing to do with the denomination and is there just to be interesting.

Print something new in it for each member; issue half of them in odd years and half in even. Hold contests.

But then perhaps your photocopiers would need constant updates - to do the usual banknote detection and refusal to copy ?

As someone with the detection mechanism tatooed on their arm, I can tell you this is not based on the visual design of the entire note, but on a small constellation of five rings, the so called EURion constellation [0]. It's also used by other bank notes around the world, inlcuding the Yen and US Dollar.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EURion_constellation

Latvia and Estonia are Baltics, not Nordics

So many of these have some building as the backdrop, but all the buildings are modernist skyscrapers and uninspired office buildings

Europe doesn't have a dearth of stunning architecture. Have they all been discarded in favor of ugly straightline modernist sloptitecture because they might be construed as offensive for some reason?

These are the central institutions of the European Union. That’s why there’re portrayed in the notes

> but all the buildings are modernist skyscrapers and uninspired office buildings

Because they are the european institutions, eg the EU parliament building, EU comission, etc.

They are mostly office buildings.

That does not mean they were the only possible choice. Personally, I find having my continent represented by them an extreme insult.

People really take offe se on everything these days.

Can you elaborate what you mean?

Are you against the idea of European cooperation in general? Or against the implementation?

If there is to be European cooperation that goes beyond heads of states talking to each other, you're going to need some kind of space where they can do that. Using that building as a symbol seems like an obvious choice albeit not a very creative one. Really struggle to see how that choice can be "extremely insulting".

The average European does not view those buildings as symbols of European cooperation. They are just another generic office building some nameless and faceless bureaucrats work in. They lack the symbolism and recognizability of some US buildings like the White House, the Capitol, or the Pentagon - which are all inherently linked to the institutions they host.

A movie showing an external shot of the White House establishes that we're going to be looking at the US President next. A movie showing an external shot of the European Parliament establishes... office drones working in the Business Factory?

You're describing American propaganda that Europeans tend to avoid...

this is because people don't even recognize the buildings. Even I only recognized the commission and the ECB. I think if we put them on our money, citizens will recognize them more!

I don't think any of these buildings has the recognizability potential. I could recognize the Commission too since I see it on TV every day, but others are generic offices. The White House has a distinct shape. The Capitol has a distinct shape. The Pentagon absolutely has a distinct shape.

I don't think the ECB will ever be recognizable (or at least won't become recognized via exposure), since it's just a glass tower like thousands of others.

> Are you against the idea of European cooperation in general? Or against the implementation?

I'm against ugly soulless buildings. Those buildings can't be a symbol for anything, because they, like all modern [1] buildings, were deliberately designed to remove all identity. They are completely generic, no different from modern buildings in Beijing, New York, or Dubai. The only thing they represent is a capitulation, or refusal, of making things beautiful.

I'd vastly prefer some national landmark of the nation that committed war crimes against us in WWI & II, than that.

[1] Or is it "modernist"? Whatever the "style" of basic geometric shapes in steel and glass is called.

Fair enough, you're not a fan of how modern buildings look. But how is that extremely insulting to you?

An extreme insult, seriously?

It seems pretty neutral, if un-exciting, to see EU institutions displayed on Euro banknotes. It also avoids the obvious pitfall of national landmarks.

Brutalist buildings in Brussels. Not a great choice for a continent with 2000+ years of very rich architecture history.

Also the ECB in frankfurt on the 50€

Perhaps making the notes as ugly and boring as possible will push folks off physical money onto trackable digital money that is just as soulless as the buildings on the notes.

they could put the ECB on the 500€ since a money factory is a decent image to put on a banknote, and follows the original bridge series theme of ancient-modern.

but find some actually nice buildings to put on the rest

This sounds very self-centered. Many people already see the EU bureaucrats as something alien, let's not give them another reason to think they're selfish.

Yeah. Bad choice.

I think it's the other way around. Many people have no idea about how the EU works and what exactly is going on there. I believe highlighting the key institutions through their iconic buildings will raise awareness and increase trust in EU institutions!

And I think that's why it was considered.

Disclaimer: IDGAF haven't used cash in years

Europe is a continent with countries that have literally centuries of enimity and nationalism between them. You cannot put a French building on a banknote.

Bland and inoffensive is what keeps the Union together. Its why Strasbourg exists. Its why there are Dutch translators despite the fact every Dutch member of parliament speeches in English.

I don't know that it's about "Bland and inoffensive" so much as about recognition that differences are fine. Two football teams don't agree about which team is best - but they do agree the rules of football. Without that there is no game.

Having multiple languages is more of that "differences are fine". The use of Directives rather than Regulations for many purposes allows a country's government to incorporate local differences in how we do things. A Regulation applies everywhere, but the Directive just tells your government to make local law to meet some goal. What we want to achieve is the same in Paris and San Gimignano but how we do it will vary by local culture.

I mean, half of these proposals put specific people from specific countries on banknotes. So it's hard to argue that it would be impossible to do the same with buildings.

I'm in the EU and you absolutely can put a French building on a banknote. I'd much rather look at the Eiffel tower or the Tower of Pisa or Neuschwanstein castle than the European Court of Auditors.

Or if you like to have something modern, Paimio Sanatorium or Turning Torso.

But that defeats the purpose of having a boring glass building, or birds or modern bridges. The underpinning ideology is that europe should have no history, no culture and no identity, because suggesting anything else 1) will offend the hyper sensitivity of modern left ideologues who think that the said culture, history and identity is terrible and should only be condemned, apologised for, and buried, and 2) would be unwelcoming to immigrants as it would suggest somehow that there is a society they should adapt to rather than the other way round.

I remember a major French pro-european politician (Modem party) attempting to define Europe (in the context of integrating Turkey), as "the friends of democracy". When you can't (or rather refuse to) define your identity, the only thing left to represent it is birds, office buildings and bridges. Notre Damme de Paris or the Pantheon in Rome are just old embarrassing historical artefacts of an evil civilisation.

no one feels unwelcomed by the Eiffel tower

Tell that to a victim of French colonialism, or to the Germans.

what, Germans love the Eiffel tower

The underpinning ideology is that Europe (meaning the EU) should have no history, no culture and no identity because they are monopoly of the member States/nations. And, as always, if you put a monument or person from some country in the banknotes, the other states will complain

I as a random Pole with a lefty euroenthusiast stance would gladly accept the Pantheon or Notre Damme. I'd prefer Colosseum and Eiffel tower though.

The blandness comes from the fact that the EU has to tiptoe around the nationalists which will be upset that a country they don't like gets a banknote, and possibly even worse - they didn't get one.

Reading back both your and my post I guess it's the radicals of either stance who the EU desperately needs to cater to, resulting in generic designs. It's erasing itself like any institution with a 1-member veto.[1]

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberum_veto

I get that we wouldn't want to single out specific nations over others on the designs. But I kinda wish we would national designs like we do for the coins, one side's standardized and the other gets a custom design depending on the nation. I think we'd get a lot very neat variety, but I understand that it makes things a lot more complicated and expensive.

These are EU government buildings; unlike the bridges in the current notes, they’re real structures, not an archetype. The EU likes a giant office block, generally.

There just shouldn’t be any buildings on those notes. Any good choices are too country specific. All of them are out imo only D & F I find actually inspired and good the rest of these designs should go straight into the bin. Stop birds, people, buildings then see what they can come up with. Gotta be better.

They asked to put EU buildings on there to grab power and cultural capital. The EU is centralizing and consolidating by any means necessary.

I feel like the design guidelines were fundamentally flawed, and as a logical result none of the design proposals are better than what we already have.

The whole "some person's face" thing doesn't work because most people won't be familiar with them. Heck, you'd be lucky if the average person is familiar with their names! The birds & buildings suffer from the same issue: never seen them, can't identify them, don't care about them. And because it references real-world things there's a very genuine risk of people being upset over being underrepresented, or the person or institution being depicted getting disgraced.

What's left is the "vague depictions of people doing random things" theming, but that's neither European nor meaningful nor distinctive. You forget about it the second you stop looking at it.

The previous two series - depicting bridge types and building styles - neatly bypassed this by being something everyone could relate to, while at the same time not referencing anything specific-enough that anyone could be upset about it. Especially the first series nailed this down perfectly.

Given the mediocre design proposals we're now left with, I think Design J is the obvious best choice. It is not actively ugly, and the various bills are at least distinct enough that they are easy to tell apart. Design H isn't too bad, but the building side is just "generic glass blob in a distance" rather than anything one would remember and recognize.

>there's a very genuine risk of people being upset over being underrepresented

Explain yourself. Who the hell could feel upset upon seeing Marie Curie, Beethoven, da Vinci or Maria Callas? They are all very recognizable, well known European figures with astounding achievements and highly respected by any true European worth its name.

Are you suggesting we should erase them because of someone's feeling?

I've never heard of Maria Callas before. Especially ridiculous because she was born in the US and Wikipedia describes her as American and Greek.

As an American who proudly claims her watch “O mio bambino caro” on YouTube. I’d recognize her version anytime. Angelic.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=l1C8NFDdFYg&ra=m

Well, the old Euro design avoided making references to specific countries and chose to use generic images of bridges for a reason. You can only put so many faces on your currency. You can't choose any set of faces without people from some countries being left out. And if you leave any country out, you are just handing munition to Eurosceptics in that country to fire at Brussels — "dear citizens, don't you feel the EU is really just about Germany and France? See, the money you spend everyday does not even bear the image of our countrymen!"

You can of course say people should just grow up and not be affected by petty sentimental arguments like this. But keep in mind, the EU is as much an economical and political project as it is a cultural project. You have to win people's hearts. And you do so by not making them feel neglected.

> The whole "some person's face" thing doesn't work because most people won't be familiar with them.

There’s millennia of history of having coins and paper money faces that most people will not be familiar with.

> The previous two series - depicting bridge types and building styles - neatly bypassed this by being something everyone could relate to,

I don’t see much difference there. Just as many people can’t see more than “man with beard” or “bird with long legs”, I bet many people can’t seen more than “old bridge” or “modern bridge” for the current designs (what fraction of the population can discriminate the €5 ‘classical’ from the €10 ‘romanesque’ (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euro_banknotes)?)

I think the whole original bridge and doorway was representing the whole idea of the Euro. The bridge between various nations, the doorway into a larger market.

As the EU is slowly growing beyond just economical ties I assume it tries to form a pan-european identity, hence why some famous European people. And Skłodowska to entice the Poles to drop their currency and finally join the Eurozone.

I still don't know who is it that they placed on the 5€ banknote

For me, across all of them only two felt actually decent for a bank note (B & E, I is okay, just not used to bank notes in that orientation, same for J, but that one should be more monochrome). Either they were too vibrant or the design was too busy/had unnecesary elements.

I also feel like the notes that had buildings (like we have now) are just.. better. The initial run of 2002-2013 remains the best aesthetically, imo.

I prefer the Birds & Rivers theme because nobody is expecting a specific bird to meet some arbitrary ideal whereas if you put identifiable humans on a banknote people start to mistake their inevitable flaws for a desirable property. I feel this more strongly for statues, but it seems desirable for the Euro or any potential international currency too.

I'm partial for statues, and birds and rivers is a good theme. I feel like if they sticked to the semi-monochrome of the previous notes I'd be more favorable to them aswell. Monochrome might be the wrong word, ESL.

For reference, the two previous runs at the top of the page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euro_banknotes

Monochrome means "single colour". Typically shades of that colour are included, so if something was dark purple lines on a light purple background we might say that's monochrome. In some cases it's taken to mean that there's just black/ grey/ white, but here it makes sense to say that e.g. one note is green, another blue, but no individuals notes are a mix of green and blue, they're monochrome.

Since you mentioned English isn't your first language, this use of the "to stick" verb where it's about adhering to something (metaphorically in your case) has a different past participle, "stuck". You wrote "sticked" which makes sense but isn't used for this meaning today. Nobody will misunderstand but it will sound wrong to them, we'd say e.g. "Perhaps if we'd stuck with Zig the game would be finished by now" or "Somebody stuck their chewing gum to the table".

Most of these new designs are monochrome excepting that the European flag is itself blue because that's what colour the flag is. A few of them are more colourful, and I see what you mean about that adding to clutter. For their purpose they're successful because the big reason to use colour is that people with very poor sight (some of whom are legally blind but do retain some ability to determine colour) can tell a red note from a blue one, the small accents in a different colour won't affect that. If your sight is good enough to figure out it's a European flag, you don't need this cue, you can read the large numerals saying "100" nearby to determine it's a €100 note.

My favourite by far is Proposal F - Jan Robert Dünnweller. A sort of retro-modern design with a more restricted use of colour, like you suggest. This one really pops and is quite unique.

The others, for the most part, aren't necessarily bad, but they are a bit boring and derivative.

> if you put identifiable humans on a banknote people start to mistake their inevitable flaws for a desirable property

Does the same logic extend all elevated positions? A person in a national portrait gallery, a person with a statue, a person with an olympic medal or a nobel prize, a person with a fancy title like president or queen?

Or is there something specific about bank notes that makes them more problematic?

They literally said they consider statues more problematic.

> a person with a fancy title like president

"President" is not a fancy title. It is, in fact, a title specifically chosen to be boring and unglamorous.

You may have noticed that all the people on these banknotes are, much like on US banknotes, dead. So that insulates them from a lot of things which happen to living people if we reconsider them.

We can and do take away honours from living people, you might remember that Paula Vennells had an OBE, but that was removed because while she hasn't and likely won't ever be actually prosecuted for it, it's obviously her fault that so many UK subpostmasters were convicted of crimes they didn't commit and in some cases even committed suicide.

Likewise the present King of England's brother would in the ordinary course of things be a pretty important guy with the title Prince and so on. But he's not, he's just Andrew because even though again he's unlikely to face prosecution it does seem like he fucked an underage girl trafficked by Epstein so the King took away his titles.

But for example Oscar Pistorius has several medals for running - not just in paralympic events but straight up against people with both legs and no running blades. The medals weren't retracted when he murdered somebody or even when he was sent to prison for the murders. Oscar still ran really fast and the medals stand. But hopefully we are clear that "Was very fast" and "Is a terrible person" are compatible ideas.

Everyone on these banknotes are dead too?

They are Euro bank notes. They are supposed to represent all of the EU. If there's even the possibility of someone getting upset over a specific portrayal you have failed at your one task.

I can't exactly get upset over "the concept of Renaissance architecture". I can get upset over, say, Beethoven fighting his sister-in-law to get the custody of her son.

I don't think anyone will want to become cranky and deaf because Beethoven is on a bank note, but putting people on them is rather arbitrary. The set looks too much like a compromise for political safety.

You've never had to bartend with a seagull.

Next crows will be holding you at gun point for the crow looking notes.

> nobody is expecting a specific bird to meet some arbitrary ideal

People will still find ways to get upset about none or too few of the birds being present in their country, or "their bird" being depicted on the "cheap" notes.

There are very few birds which are commonly seen throughout all of the EU, from cold and wet Finland to hot and dry Spain. Virtually all birds have a limited geographical living area, which means you are automatically unintentionally playing favorites with countries.

Pan-European Migratory Species:

Barn Swallow (Hirundo rustica): Migrates and breeds across all EU territories from Southern to Northern Europe.

White Stork (Ciconia ciconia): Uses major European flyways crossing through virtually all EU nations during spring and autumn migration.

European Robin (Erithacus rubecula): Widespread resident and migrant present in every EU country.

Common Quail (Coturnix coturnix): A highly migratory ground bird breeding regularly in all EU member states.

Eurasian Blackcap (Sylvia atricapilla): A remarkably adaptable migratory songbird found traversing or breeding in every EU country.

Additional Widespread European Migrants:

Common Swift (Apus apus): Spends summers breeding in all EU nations before migrating to Sub-Saharan Africa.

Common Cuckoo (Cuculus canorus): A widespread brood parasite present across every EU country during the spring breeding season. <~ probably not the image one would want on a 5 Euro note.

Eurasian Skylark (Alauda arvensis): Moves dynamically across all EU borders, adapting via partial migration.

Song Thrush (Turdus philomelos): A migratory and resident songbird found throughout the entire European Union. <~ due to homonym in English for a medical condition. probably not the right image either.

Common Chiffchaff (Phylloscopus collybita): A highly migratory leaf warbler that breeds or passes through every EU state.

Many species of birds are HIGHLY migratory, spend some part of every year chasing weather that supports and provides food for them.

Some of these make round trips from the sub-Arctic to sub-Saharan climates every year. So a list of birds that is acceptable and not 'favoring' any one nation is an easy move. Choosing birds that actually are found in all 27 member nations is a great idea.

Even Malta and Cyprus see all ten of these species as they provide important migration stopovers in the Mediterranean during migration and a few of these species, the Quail even manages to have historically had breeding populations in both, as well as using the islands as key migratory stopovers.

Using birds on an Euro note can help draw public awareness to the ongoing need for cooperation among nations in the protections of a shared symbol of natural freedom, which migratory birds embody.

Let's just settle it with pigeons, chickens and turkeys.

Maybe too early for the turkeys right now...

I think H works too. It's a good compromise between fresh colors and familiar design.

> same for J, but that one should be more monochrome

The color is actually the main reason I dislike that design the least!

All the monochrome blobs do have a more traditional bank note feeling, but the complete lack of contrast makes them unmemorable and hard to identify. You can't trivially tell them apart at a quick glance, you have to either actively read the number or identify it by color. But the numbers aren't big enough for reading, and there are a lot of colorblind people.

Try opening them up in a photo editing tool. Blur them and desaturate them a bunch. Can you still tell them apart?

Faces on Euro banknotes are a terrible idea. Even internationally well-known personalities are associated with certain countries, and you do not put things that represent specific countries on banknotes used in different countries.

The EU isn't a federation, and having a single currency doesn't make the eurozone any more so.

The buildings aren't as bad, being european insitution headquarters. However, as they aren't necessarily widely recognizable, they come out a bit self serving.

You think people of some countries might protest Gutenberg, Einstein, Leonardo da Vinci, Maria Callas, Beethoven, or Marrie Currie?

If such people exist, fuck em.

It's not a matter of protesting (nor is it a matter of nationalism).

It's a matter of bureocrats remembering that there are more countries in the eurozone than banknotes, and even if that wasn't the case, their denominations can be read as hierarchy.

So shuffle them around. We already have a million coin designs. One side can remain constant, no problem.

It's not about protesting, it's about representation. They were born into what are now, Germany, Germany, Italy, USA, Germany, Polish.

Why not any of the below ?

Austria: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Belgium: Georges Lemaître Bulgaria: Saint Cyril Croatia: Nikola Tesla Cyprus: Zeno of Citium Czechia: Franz Kafka Denmark: Hans Christian Andersen Estonia: Jaan Kross Finland: Jean Sibelius France: Napoleon Bonaparte Greece: Aristotle Hungary: Franz Liszt Ireland: James Joyce Latvia: Mark Rothko Lithuania: Mikalojus Konstantinas Čiurlionis Luxembourg: Robert Schuman Malta: Jean de Valette Netherlands: Rembrandt van Rijn Portugal: Vasco da Gama Romania: Nadia Comăneci Slovakia: Andy Warhol Slovenia: Slavoj Žižek Spain: Pablo Picasso Sweden: Alfred Nobel

Why was Callas chosen over Joyce ? why was Beethovan chosen over Mozart ?

Beethoven in particular is easy. The EU doesn't have a national anthem, or a national flag, because it insists it isn't a nation, but Europe does have an anthem and a flag and of course the EU represents Europe, so it uses those, that's Europe's flag on the money. Europe's anthem is basically the bit you know from Beethoven's Ninth Symphony.

Officially the EU prefers Karajan's arrangement, if you're a huge classical music fan you'll recognise this immediately, but for most people it's just obviously the Ninth.

Case in point:

Nikola Tesla wasn't Croatian. He was Serbian.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikola_Tesla

oh attempting to put anyone from what now is ex-Jugoslavia on a banknote is a recipe for yet another genocide

Sibelius was already in the last series of Finnish notes, so personally I'd pick Tove Jansson.

Good point, however

> Latvia: Mark Rothko

Marcus Rotkowitz was Jewish, born in Dvinsk, Russian Empire (today Daugavpils in Latvia) and emigrated when he was 10 (and Latvia wasn't a country yet.) At home, he spoke Yiddish and Russian, and probably didn't know a word in Latvian (at the time, Dvinsk population was half Jewish, with the rest divided between Russians, Poles, and Latvians).

Your idea that he's the guy who should represent Latvia on a European banknote would probably quickly get you burned at the stake at Doms Square in Riga.

*Maria Skłodowska-Curie

Yeah, that's precisely one of the reasons why there shouldn't be faces on bank notes. Shame on the nationalists that managed to make dreck out of it.

Of course not, but people may complain that none of them are from their country. Maybe someone from Spain would like to see Picasso or some other famous Spanish figure in there. That's the reason for using generic images, the EU and the Eurozone in particular is a trade alliance of countries with different cultures.

I like what they did with coins the best, where one face is common, showing a map of Europe, and the other is free for the issuing country to choose from. I like the message it delivers, different cultures, united. And as people travel, they will bring coins from their countries, the resulting effect is that if you go to a Eurozone country, you are likely to see coins in circulation from all over Europe, which is a concrete example of free trade happening.

I wish they did the same for banknotes: one side generic, one side country-specific, but it may be impractical.

The reason not to do this with banknotes is that they wouldn't be accepted. "No weird money".

I happen to live in a city on England's south coast. So Scotland is quite far away and understandably Scottish banknotes, though legally equivalent to the notes you'd get here in most senses, are rarely seen. I know what they're supposed to look like and that they're 1:1 equivalent, but of course the guy who runs the Chinese takeaway near me wouldn't have seen one before. So what happens when a Glaswegian down for the weekend wants to order some food and tries to pay with the Scottish £10 in his wallet? The owner doesn't accept it. "No, no, no!". The Glaswegian insists it's legal tender [which is irrelevant, but if you don't know why it's irrelevant feel free to go look it up, it's not helpful for me to tell him this even if he believes me and I see no reason I need to explain to you either] and of course all the time they're arguing about money I am not getting my food.

So I took the man's Scottish £10 and handed the restaurant owner an English £10 because I don't care and now I can order food. Weird money is bad.

If you live in a border town you'd see notes from both sides. If you work in a tourist-facing industry you might recognise most of the variants because tourists tend to have their country's notes. But if you're some small town shopkeeper in Poland why would you know that this is real €200 note from Luxemboug? It's probably a fake, isn't it? So you make friction for these notes higher (some shopkeepers won't accept them) and even if legally they're fine you can't fix that friction in practice so people hate this outcome.

The Glaswegian would be incorrect in his insistence:

https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/explainers/what-is-legal-ten...

As I pointed out already, it's irrelevant so the fact it's technically wrong is also irrelevant.

> Marrie Currie?

An excellent example of possible problems! She is Maria Skłodowska-Curie and she herself preferred this variant

I really hate social media. “Jesus” Christ.

It's "Marie Curie". Marrie Currie invented the curry.

I sort of disagree, the faces SHOULD foster a unified identification as European. And at least on paper they do kind of nicely, imho. No one can argue with Da Vinci. Curie is Polish-French. Callas is internationally beloved and Greek. Beethoven is potentially the second-best known world-wide behind Da Vinci, and can be claimed by the whole German-speaking area, at least Germany and Austria. Cervantes is perhaps more obscure as a face, but well-deserved and everyone knows “quixotic”. Von Suttner is the most obscure and probably overrepresents the German-speaking countries, but it’s Europe, so the pacifist angle is hard to argue against.

Everyone can think of similarly deserving people. They should do it like the coins and just have an abundance of motifs from every country. Since they’re too scared to put english text on them, put a QR code link to some short text in every language. I cringe at the idea of QR codes in general, but what are you going to do.

The buildings are all the same steel and glass bullshit and represent nothing if not the widely despised bureaucratic aspects of the EU. The birds at least look nice, but they’re boring and hyper-harmless.

I'm europeist (but no longer a federationist after the cooperation debacle that was the eurocrisis) and I have no issue with the choice of personalities.

I do have an issue with anything that might be interpreted as the proposals of some countries having had more weight that others.

There's a reason why the current Euro banknotes represent bridges that do not exist in the real world.

> Beethoven is potentially the second-best known world-wide behind Da Vinci

You mean Europeans? Because I highly doubt more ppl know about them than about Jesus. And I'd claim the most well known European is probably Hitler, through infamy.

Jesus isn’t European

>>> Beethoven is potentially the second-best known world-wide behind Da Vinci

>>You mean Europeans?

>Jesus isn’t European

That's exactly the point?

I mean of the proposed designs. Actually, why not have Hitler. I wouldn’t mind a “never again” series with infamous faces from every country. Could be fun, lol.

> Curie is Polish-French. Callas is internationally beloved and Greek.

Erm... by this logic either: "Currie is French" or "Callas is American"

Also: you meant "Skłodowska"? :P

You see the issues here? ;)

Your issue is that people in Spain look at their note and think “da Vinci isn’t us, he’s them”.

Their idea is that they want people all over the EU to think of da Vinci as “us”. Over time, it’ll become more normal to consider luminaries from other European countries as part of the shared heritage.

That said there will be countries that may ask why their guy can’t make it to the note. Why not Herge, the Belgians might ask? The question is left as an exercise to the reader.

Your last question is something to consider in the current context of rising nationalism, which is all about the perception of being left out (even in the larger countries, where that perception is about each other).

Okay but would people in Spain really have an issue with da Vinci? isn't he cool af to everyone? isn't the Italian renaissance shared European history?

Is it too much to ask to consider that the people on the banknotes are/will be depicted because they are European, and not because they come from any member State in particular?

I feel like this comment section is all about people searching for a reason to get offended.

How dare you to use a face! How dare you to use a building! How dare they use something some country specific! And even worst, generic! Oh no, a building of an institution!

No matter what is in, people looking to twist it in offense will find a reason.

Faces and buildings objectively make for ugly currency. Birds are somewhat okay, they disregard borders. I would have preferred more varied fauna or flora.

Just take a look at Maldive's currency and tell me that this proposal isn't terribly boring.

I genuinely liked how these buildings design looked. I like birds too.

I found faces more of uglier, but that is not the same as offensive. I dont feel insulted over the faces, they are just more boring to look at.

I think there is massive difference between "I prefer this other picture" or "this is ugly" and the "it is insulting and offensive" people do here.

I found currency in circulation from the Maldives Central Bank here: https://mma.gov.mv/#/currency/notesincirculation

For me, the 20 rufiyaa bill is the most interesting design.

I don't see anyone getting offended. People are allowed to disagree and dislike, and argue in a civilized manner, which is what I do see.

I personally consider these people European more than their specific nationality, but more importantly they to me represent European humanities, science, and so on.

> Faces on Euro banknotes are a terrible idea. Even internationally well-known personalities are associated with certain countries

Why do you believe that? That sounds overly nationalistic to me. In the Schengen zone you can live and work in any country. Europe even accepts a lot of undocumented people from outside Europe, willingly. The whole European project seems to be about breaking down national borders in a pro-human way. Why take humans out of it?

You're free to read it as nationalism if you like, although I 'm very far from being nationalist, and I'd prefer if my paper money didn't provide fuel for nationalism.

The European project has worked all these years because it stands on the idea that we are all europeans with shared values, but also different countries with our own cultures. We are all the same yet different. The Euro banknotes (even though the Euro and the EU aren't the same thing) should represent that, not look like some specific nation's currency, which is what faces (any face no matter the personality) evokes.

PS: Perhaps paradoxically, the faces on Euro coins are a good idea (I like having my wallet populated with coins from different countries), for the same reason they're a bad idea on notes.

I think that actually these specific people would be a great choice for the Euro banknotes, because they are inspiring across borders. None of them are "national heroes". In Germany, we like Beethoven not because he was an exemplary German, but because he wrote bangers. In Germany, we look up to Marie Curie, because she won two Nobel prizes for cool research, no matter her nationalities! And they both migrated between European countries, like exemplary Europeans.

Yes Germany is so progressive that explains the AFD.

Look nobody in the Netherlands believes we share values with other countries the EU is just a good deal. The moment that stops and its auf Wiedersehen.

You know what, I have seen many hypothetical criticisms like this, but not a single complaint from someone whose country would "not be represented". Maybe this just isn't a problem? Like I'm from Germany, and I would be completely fine if they had picked only people from e.g. eastern Europe, if they were cool enough!

I really dislike the back of the notes on pretty much all of them. Generic crowds of people with ugly backdrops, just feels very uninspired especially when some of the front designs are so bold

I agree. There's one Da Vinci with the Vitruvian man on the back. The back should complement the front, right?

A) Front is nice, but I can't get over the shadow people in the backside

B) The most boring of the options. The tiny text with the bird facts should not be there.

C) Corporate hellscape.

D) wtf are those hands doing here

E) Again fronts look better than backs; fronts are very traditional bank-note to me.

F) Most interesting option. Certainly feels different than any other bank note I recall.

G) Ugh random vector shapes and gradients. Ugly in same ways as C)

H) Very inoffensive, very boring. Competing with B) in the most boring category.

I) Bit too much going on. The river map thing on the back side should be distinct in each note

J) The visual "sketchy" style just doesn't feel right here.

Ultimately F is visually my favourite although like many others I do dislike the "famous people" theme. Design I could be very nice with some tweaks

I like the ones you find boring (but not the corporate Memphis ones) - money is a serious matter, so it's IMO supposed to look serious and a little boring.

+1 for boring!

I feel like banknotes is one of the few common-places that EU could convey some sort of "shared vision/purpose" that is largely missing in general. From this perspective "boring" as in buildings etc are not very good options as they do not convey anything positive, and make it look further "cold and distant" from people. While options like F show a vision which europe could aim towards.

Of course then, on the other hand, the boring options are in this sense the most honest ones.

While I don't really particularly like any of the designs, the F option is absolutely wild and I feel it would really make the Euro notes standout in the world. I don't know that it would make for a good bank note design, but it is visibly distinct.

The birds on J is incredibly beautiful, but that's somewhat offset by the building on the reverse.

H) is my favorite. Nicely detailed birds, less crowded designs.

Anything with a face, I'm tired of that trope of banknote design.

D) is notably the one mixing best vertical and horizontal view.

I guess we are used to a horizontal layout, some try to be bold with completely vertical but it won't be easy to identify in my wallet.

So I would grant D) that fine balance argument.

I found it hard to vote just by saying "I like this design" for each one individually. Since we have a set of limited option, I'd rather compare and pick the ones I prefer in comparison of the others.

I helped Claude build a simple web app (static, local, oss) to make you choose among pairs, to progressively determine your personal preference.

It outputs your top 3, you can share the summary like this:

  Recto Verso Euro  
  My top euro banknote designs:  
   Design H  
   Design D
   Design B
  → https://pil0u.github.io/recto-verso-euro/#r=HDBJIGECFA&c=68

It's very WIP, but I found this approach useful to fill the survey, so why not share

I scanned through it and settled on Design H as well, birds and buildings. One thing I started to notice while looking over the design that I had a strong preference for the number to be in the corners. The last two one are "portrait" which feels weird to me but might be more appealing to a younger generation.

I can get behind some comments here that the buildings are representative of the institution of Europe, not the people. I love the birds, and probably naturally settled to the one where the buildings are less visible ^^

In Canada, we have ONE bill with a vertical orientation. [0] The other notes (5$, 20$, 50$, 100$), though designed a bit earlier than then vertical 10$ note but definitely in the same style, are horizontal. There is also a discontinued, but still circulating, horizontal 10$ bill.

I have zero reason to complain honestly. It's never impacted me negatively at all... but aestetically it feels weird when mixed together with other bills.

If you're sorting money, you'll already know which ones are 10$ because they're that colour of purple... but the number won't be facing the right way. If you're making an ATM UI that lets people pick what mix of bills to withdrawl, RBC chose to show pictures of the bills for some reason, featuring the old horizontal 10$ bill (which it doesn't dispense) because clearly the actual 10$ bill wouldn't fit in the UI. [1] (I didn't expect this to be illustrated by a random youtube video, but it turns out the internet has everything.)

Is that a problem? No. Is it juuust weird enough that family from overseas visting me will mention how weird it is every single time they use an ATM? Yes.

If the euro switched to vertical all at once maybe that wouldn't be as weird, but the old horizontal bills are going to be circulating for a long time.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_ten-dollar_note

[1] https://youtu.be/sRxo_L9ODwo?si=pihBzi4XTaLoXngF&t=47 (Warning, you have better things to do with your time than watch the slowest person ever withdraw two 10$ bills)

Added 20+ languages in the mix, based on the available languages in the survey

Recto Verso Euro My favourite euro banknote designs: Design B Design H Design E → https://pil0u.github.io/recto-verso-euro/#r=BHECADFIGJ&c=100

Very cool, it made me realize I really like landscape designs which are generic.

Birds are clearly superior.

I don't like to have silhouettes instead of people on the back, and that buildings related to the current institutions are featured on so many designs

These are a current necessities, but nothing to sanctuarize for the future. The only thing that should remain stable in Europe are ideas, and the Swiss got it better on their notes

> These are a current necessities, but nothing to sanctuarize for the future.

Although the ECB does not today "withdraw" notes in the sense that they cease to be valid for most purposes, it does deliberately destroy old notes and issue new ones with different images to replace them, so the original series must be getting pretty rare by now - not rare enough to be worth serious collectors paying money for it, but your ten year old may never have seen an actual old Euro €500 note even though in principle those still are valid money in the Eurozone.

> deliberately destroy old notes and issue new ones with different images to replace them

Big part of the reason for this appears to be security. Many years ago a high-ranking official from Finnish central bank told in an interview that bank notes need to be redesigned approximately once per decade. Reason is that it takes about that long for the materials and printing technology to get commoditised enough for criminal enterprises to be able to start manufacturing "high-grade" forgeries at any real scale.

Every generation of bank notes employs a whole bunch of newly developed technologies and tricks that make the notes themselves distinctive, as well as incredibly difficult[ß] to forge.

ß: Some of it is down to tightly locked down and guarded speciality supply chains. Some is due to advances in microprinting and ilk. If you had unlimited resources, you could arrange to have the necessary equipment, supplies, staff and materials to print your own forged money. It'd just be slow, low-yield and very expensive.

Design H ftw

Birds aren't real.

That's exactly why they are a better choice, like the imaginary bridges on current Euro banknotes.

The selection of people is also quite poor but that's because people are a poor choice: Most notable historical people are very linked to specific countries, often against other countries so picking neutral ones is hard. They also clearly decided to have an equal number of men and women, which makes it even harder. Obviously there aren't enough different banknotes to represent every country, either.

Exactly.

Faces are a terrible idea for a common currency shared by 21 countries.

You have to pick one writer, good that the English left for good so Shakespeare's out, but how do the French feel about Cervantes vs. Victor Hugo?

The Poles complaining that they didn't get enough recognition because Marie Curie's maiden name isn't given enough prominence should tell you all there is to know about this being a good idea.

> how do the French feel about Cervantes vs. Victor Hugo?

I don't think anybody would mind since there's already Marie Curie, which is an obvious choice because she's both Polish and French. I don't know how the Polish take it but the French have no particular feelings about her being Polish as well.

You still need to tread carefully as @ncruses said. So not Marie Curie but Maria Skłodowska-Curie.

Maria Skłodowska-Curie was very helpful, at trying to solve #2 and #5 countries (by population) in one stroke. Good that the big 5 EU countries were simple enough to cover.

But why are a Greek-American, and an - unknown to the majority of Europeans - Austrian in there?

How many counties more populous than Austria are unrepresented? Do all EU countries count, or just EZ? (Poland is not EZ, is represented, still complained)

It's an impossible list. Europeans don't necessarily have shared heroes, and if they did, some of these wouldn't be top 6.

Heroes fought and died fighting countries that are in the EU today. Obviously you can't have them on the banknotes.

As for the smaller countries- well let's face it do you think anyone in Europe gives a shit about Dutch or Estonian history and culture? Its France and Germany all the way down I'm afraid. At least we still have the veto.

Maybe your heroes did.

And no one gives a shit about the (18 million) Dutch, but we picked Bertha von Suttner.

Yeah I am not a europhile who wants to deny the last 1000 years happened and start singing kumbaya. Want to know why? Because I don't believe it.

They could have done the same thing they did with the coins and make every country put their own faces in there.

Note that even for that, countries had to chose neutral things not to create problems.

Aren't they? Pictures are quite small, but B50 is clearly a stork. B100 looks like some kind of heron maybe, not sure. B10 is a kingfisher, I suppose. I don't know, they look real enough to me.

Seems like some people are missing the joke

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Birds_Aren%27t_Real

Birds are the way.

I feel like birds are the superior front, but boring EU buildings are the worse back.

I'd like the birds front with the other option for the back (public squares or something?)

I want someone to slap a blackbird on my bank notes. Preferably all denominations.

I try to pay everything in cash as much as I can, so it's nice to see the banknotes get some love from the ECB (even though the absence of €1 and €2 banknotes still hurts…).

I think it's a bit strange to feature people on these, plus it would be difficult to agree on who to feature between the 21 € states. The birds look cool! But it would have been nice to modernize the current architecture-based design rather than feature random EU office buildings.

> plus it would be difficult to agree on who to feature between the 21 € states.

What do you mean? Clearly they did agree, which is why we have those design proposals. Those aren’t random people chosen by the designers, they were in the brief.

https://www.ecb.europa.eu/press/pr/date/2025/html/ecb.pr2501...

Me too, #NormalizeCash

Cash is freedom.

Cash is king.

That’s not meant to be interpreted literally tho

I wonder how much of cash transactions are actually legitimate. It’s usually drugs, illicit services or untaxed income. While I don’t like tax just as much as next guy, the blatant dodging of is what me. Sure there are few legit privacy freaks and some genuinely unbanked. But blending those into single pot makes it much worse as they are already associated with fringes of society.

How could it possibly be interpreted literally?

Instating a monarchy with cash as regent? How would that work in daily life?

#WhyNotBoth?

> absence of €1 and €2 banknotes

The US style? I much prefer the Japanese style instead (where €5 would be a coin instead of a note). When our largest coin is too small to buy a drink at a vending machine we've got a problem. ATMs don't turn over €5 notes anyway, so their existence is painfully awkward.

Why, though? I'd much prefer not to carry any coins at all, ever since I gave up and stopped fighting the Big Brother (I applaud everyone who still does, but it just didn't seem like my struggle was productive). I mean, to think of it, coins never were very nice to use, I just wasn't bothered by it, because the volume of cash on me was quite significant anyway. Now it's not and I just don't carry any coins at all. Paper is so much nicer to handle. I still need to have some cash just in case, but I'd simply "forgive" any change below 1€ now. I don't feel rich enough to forgive everything below 5€ though.

Coins are far more durable and usually easier for machines to properly sense. If you're using vending machines to buy drinks it's nice just dropping a coin or two into a machine and getting a beverage. Notes can get worn and fail to read properly by machines taking bills in the field. When you need like 5 of the most widely circulated coins for a single drink it gets annoying though.

I miss seeing machines that would bend a 12oz can of soda for 25¢. Those were the days.

I sometimes go to coin-op car washes, it sucks having to punch a fist full of quarters into the machine for a quick wash.

> I miss seeing machines that would bend a 12oz can of soda for 25¢. Those were the days.

A bending machine?

Oops, what a funny autocorrect. A vending machine.

Bills are imo way easier to manage and carry, especially when you don't have a wallet, which is why I prefer the US system, but I agree that durability is the main issue.

Coins don't fold, though. Carrying a few bills around in a money clip is trivial, coins quickly devolve into carrying a giant pile of loose change with near-zero value.

The main reason I don't use more cash is that it is so inconvenient. I don't want any coins back as change, and always telling cashiers to keep the change when the smallest bill is €5 is just too much for me.

> coins quickly devolve into carrying a giant pile of loose change with near-zero value.

Which is why it'd be better if they weren't all nearly zero value in today's money. Coins of tiny value really suck, I agree. What am I going to do with nickels and dimes, really? So useless.

I also agree bills made from that plastic material seem to hold up better and scan better by machines than the "paper" used in USD, so that's less of a concern.

When going home after training I sometimes like to get something to drink at the station and the stands are usually closed so I need to get something from a vending machine. Those only accept coins or contactless payment by card, and as I have disabled contactless payment with my card (after having seen a documentary where two people managed to obtain €240 in 2 hours) coins it is. But, because even the largest coin is insufficient, it's a bit of a pain to maintain the coinage balance in my wallet; which would be easier if there was a coin large enough to pay for a drink without needing extras.

Although on second thought if there were larger coins in circulation then vending machines would be more lucrative targets and the increased vandalism and theft would lead to even fewer vending machines being around.

ATS return 5€, or did I miss something? Also: vending machines can take notes as well, so I really don't get the argument

Here in Belgium neither is the case (or maybe I'm just unlucky with my bank and vending machines), but that might just be Belgium being a shithole again.

Okay interesting, I don't use much cash! Gonna try in Germany, but I always took out x5€ haha

Most ATMs I have used don't. Most of the time it is 20+ ime.

I'm in Paris and can confirm that most ATMs don't give €5 bills, but some do, and it's pretty nice to withdraw a stack of fresh, brand new €5 bills that are way more convenient than coins.

Wow, I had to dig this deep down the thread to find a comment that doesn't sound grumpy and offended. It's just banknotes. Honestly.

There were some clearly superior suggestions they left out: https://xcancel.com/The_Davos_Man/status/2080383908823081426

;)

You know, that actually isn't the worst idea! Putting tangible results of the EU on the Euro would constantly remember people that the EU isn't just some nameless and faceless bureaucrats doing busy-work in an office building in Brussels.

The cookie notification is of course a bit silly, but a "Thanks to the EU you'll never lose another bottle cap" or a "This standardized USB-C charger is brought to you by the EU" would do wonders for its PR.

Why is it all either the same people or the same birds?

Was that an explicit part of the brief artists were given?

I feel like the selection of motifs is more interesting and where more of the creative process in defining a representation of Europe lies than just how to draw and layout those motifs.

Yes, the motifs were selected ~1.5y ago: https://www.ecb.europa.eu/press/pr/date/2025/html/ecb.pr2501...

As an Austrian, it feels a bit annoying that the Germans got their one famous composer - they're kind of our thing! Why not Mozart, Strauss, Haydn, Schubert?

It's also unfortunate that the nice peaceful bird motif was paired with the ugly modern buildings on the other side.

I'm sure most countries will have their pet peeves with this; I've seen a bunch of Polish people being upset about the phrasing of Marie Curie's name already.

> Germans got their one famous composer

I think you just made J.S. Bach roll over in his grave.

And don't forget: Brahms, Handel, Schumann, Mendelssohn, Richard Strauss, Wagner.

The competition is not so one-sided.

At least you can be sure that Germans won't "adopt" them, e.g. you can often read "the german architect Hundertwasser" or "the german author Kafka" :-/

On the other side: most classic composers are from times when there was no Germany. E.g. J. S. Bach is from Sachsen-Eisenach :-)

In a similar vein, who gets to claim Nicola Tesla?

Europe used to be much more of a mess than today's neatly drawn nation states, retroactively assigning origin is a silly endeavour.

Or Adolf Hitler, who was clearly Austrian! He kinda made up being German by himself, so it doesn't count.

(Edited "Germany" to German - "Germany" was an interesting typo and not entirely wrong: He said "One people, one empire, one leader!")

Because he composed the anthem?

Don't you worry. This is a political process and politicians are basically big children, so no country will ever accept notes without someone famous from their country on the note.

So al will be watered down to abstract art or animals in the end, so that the suggestion with the least amount of friction gets accepted.

Like all decision in democracy, it is not about finding the best solution, it's about the solution with the least nr of votes against it. That is why democracy never works in the long term, because it is a long, drawn out, trip to the bottom.

TBH the only acceptable approach here would be similar to coins - where each member state may print their own people on some of the notes to keep representation.

Putting 6 people of 27 member states is just asking for trouble and lacks representation.

(I still prefer the current approach of using non-existing bridgets as a motif.)

nothing works in the long term for the right definition of long

" Like all decision in democracy, it is not about finding the best solution, it's about the solution with the least nr of votes against it. That is why democracy never works in the long term, because it is a long, drawn out, trip to the bottom. "

Working democracies are the countries with most livable places on Earth..this includes many countries in Europe.

democracy is the worst form of government except all those other forms that have been tried

So livable that people are no longer having children? So livable, that people no longer see any hope or meaning in their lives and the future?

The highest incomes on the planet, are in monarchies like Liechtenstein and Monaco. Singapore, which cannot be called a democracy, is one of the safest countries on the planet.

Another interesting way to look at it is at the debt. The debt of most (all?) democracies is sky rocketing. That means the "livability" is an illusion paid for by borrowed money.

Liechtenstein is heavenly tied to Switzerland, Monaco to France. They don't exist without Democracies.

Safety is definitely not the only metric on Life quality. There is a reason why Singapore is called Singaboor and South Korea, Japan and Taiwan have a way more cultural impact.

Nonsense... look at a map. But nice attempt at shifting the goal posts though! ;)

> Mozart

I don't want to open old wounds but Mozart's nationality is debated and warrants its own long Wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozart%27s_nationality

These people can't be serious. They're just trolling.

César Franck was Dutch, BTW.

Bertha von Suttner on the 200 EUR is Austrian

I've never seen a 200€ note irl (and not the no more printed but still legal tender 500€ either)

I onve saw a €500 note when I was exchanging guilders at the fentral bank and asked if I could see one. They showed me, from behind the glass. It's big

Composers are an austrian thing? lol Europe has plenty of composers all over, especially Germany

Beethoven was born in the 18th century. Germany did not exist yet.

Was gonna say the same thing. Also by the standards of the time one could argue that Austria and Germany where kinda the same thing. There's a parallel history where Austria could have ended up being another German Lander. Nationalism is a weird and now anachronic 19th century invention.

Offensively dull. One shudders to think about the endless bickering that went in to this.

May I propose 6 shades of off-white adorned with geometric shapes. €5 gets dots, €10 lines, €20 triangles and so on. €100 may have pentagrams instead of pentagons to keep Twitter on its toes.

I don’t know; I think the fact that the designs are so different from each other is actually a testament to the fact that the brief was actually pretty well written, because it allowed so many different interpretations!

And that’s only the finalist 10; I’d genuinely love to see the whole submission set.

I wonder if it would have permissible to submit the birds (obviously great) and the buildings as as they could have looked if they embodied the combined architectural prowess of the union.. in place of the vitreous crimes against aesthetics that happened to be cheap enough when construction started.

Pentagons are plenty occult fnord!

The people and birds (and I think the buildings as well) were selected by a committee beforehand, to make sure they represent all of the EU, aren't controversial, yadayada...

Yeah, the motifs was probably part of the brief as picking the symbols to represent the entire EU is incredibly political and its just best to separate that discussion from the deeply subjective "what looks best" discussion.

It's a shame due to Brexit there will be no Count Binface €10.

The Monnaie de Paris could still do a coin series with him, just to spite Farage.

How much red tape is there to do this in the age of the Euro?

A more realistic idea may be they could pledge the funds for moving the hand dryer in the men's toilet at the Crown and Treaty pub, which, as you probably have heard, is a in a terribly inconvenient location.

I do hope we get Charles Martel though.

The main benefit of Brexit is that the EU is now able to use English as a neutral universal language which is both commonly-known and doesn't favor any individual member state.

Clearly the best choice would've been to extend this and put British buildings or British historical people on the next generation of Euro notes. It would favor no EU country, so clearly it is the most neutral option. /s

>The main benefit of Brexit is that the EU is now able to use English as a neutral universal language which is both commonly-known and doesn't favor any individual member state.

Ireland was a signatory to the Maastricht Treaty, but once again we are reminded of the need to equally consider smaller nations when discussing EUwide matters ;-)

And I don't think Brexit had any benefits. They already don't use the Euro so they can do weird neoliberal wonk stuff to their heart's contents, and they have nukes so we'll be feeding them one way or another so why worry? (That's what we've taught the world by letting NK get them BTW.)

Hope it's the birds. I suppose there's no way to vote or anything with the current level of technological advancement, and the final design will be chosen by professional choosers that are handsomely paid for their hard work?

There's a public survey: https://surveys.ecb.europa.eu/10b/neweuro/

Thank you. I wish they had used a pairwise comparison system like the one built by pil0u [1] for this. If I hadn't looked at all of them in advance, I would've had to go back to "normalize" my previous answers after seeing one that I especially like/hate.

[1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49041625

There's a survey link. Not sure it works as Cloudflare blocks me from accessing it. Oh the irony, having my opinion as EU citizen about an EU issue blocked by some silly US company.

I want some birds too!

Share a screenshot of the block?

It's the typical Cloudflare error where it tells you "Your browser sucks", not sure what a screenshot would help. :)

An error that shows Cloudflare's logo might not be a Cloudflare error but a website who has configured to block you. A screenshots shows what it might be.

A better link might be https://www.ecb.europa.eu/euro/banknotes/future_banknotes/ht..., which has all of the proposals on a single page for easier browsing.

Not sure if it is much better, the images are tiny on that version and the companion text explaining the designs seems to be missin (though that sort of text you can usually do without).

The actual images are pretty big so you can just use your browser's native zooming capabilities.

I found that much nicer than constantly clicking to show the reverse sides, but to each their own!

The article one also misses on the size differences across notes. Not the biggest deal, but should be shown.

I wish I've seen this before clicking 2359 times :/ Thanks anyway at least now I can share the right experience with people so they won't suffer like me.

Also I like birds. H looks nice.

Yeah, either H or B bird faces would work. Both are nice.

I don't like the idea of using faces in the banknotes - when will North Macedonia get its turn and with whom? When will Ireland get its turn? Bulgaria?

Birds are neutral and nice.

Also for the back, much rather I'd have the EU map instead of clunky EU institutions, else people will just see that as more evidence of further EU intrusion.

Thanks! changed from https://www.ecb.europa.eu/euro/banknotes/future_banknotes/ht... above. I've put the original URL in the toptext.

Flip sides on all of them look like they are taken from a random free vector illustrations archive.

Yup terribly bad. I pick the birds: those with portraits of people are really badly fucked up and the faces do not integrate well at all with the notes.

The current ones are much better looking than any of those.

The survey is completely useless. Just let me vote on pairs of designs which I like more, then aggregate the data. It's not that hard to program and a hundred times more accurate and useful.

Incidentally, there’s an open role at the ECB for “Traineeship in environmental sustainability in banknote production”, sounds like a fun job for the right person: https://talent.ecb.europa.eu/careers/JobDetail/Traineeship-i...

They really shouldn't be people. Birds are fine, but I like the bridges, why are the moving away from those?

Perhaps because they don't want to have only Dutch landmarks on the notes?

Are they going to switch to plastic while they're at it?

That's the only thing I'll miss if Romania ever switches to Euro. Cash you can launder. Literally.

I assumed everywhere except the USA had converted to plastic... It's so much better.

Paper cash is made from cotton fiber, it easily survives the washing machine.

Not in my experience... but then I haven't had "paper" cash since 200x (small x).

Euroes are cotton fiber and washable. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5mCVOAXLg00

I would refrain from using people considering some of them may (become) controversial or are controversial depending on a country, there will never be agreement on someone who is not controversial at all and after all each country can use them on their coins if they feel the urge.

The birds idea is good, I like:

B - nice realistic

D/I/J - don't like vertical design (though I like colorful birds in J)

H - the most beautiful work of art, it would be my choice

Btw. why not use more designs at same time? I like Hong Kong approach to currency design (multiple commercial banks issue the banknotes under government regulation, three authorized banks—HSBC, Standard Chartered Bank, and Bank of China—design and print their own notes for daily use, while the government issues coins and the $10 note).

And very controversial idea, but this would be more suitable for national currency and not for eurozone - use banknotes as ad space companies can purchase, but it would have to be very very very costly space for country's budget to benefit from this. Though I like the idea of paying Pepsi with Coca Cola banknote.

The people choosing these banknotes put their office buildings on the money. They also seemed to have a gender quota, and have put on the 200 euro someone who is unknown to most Europeans (Marie Curie and Maria Callas were popular on the other hand).

Honestly, I enjoy plenty of benefits from the EU, but this non-representative style of decision-making makes me understand the EU-haters.

> unknown to most Europeans

Good opportunity to learn!

Why Bertha von Suttner and not someone like Dag Hammarskjold for instance? Why not my grandmother? She brokered peace between all our neighbours.

When you propose someone, the burden of proof is on you to say why that specific option should be chosen, instead of anything else possible.

B (with the bird) brings back 100 guilder vibes. https://europost.nl/winkel/bankbiljetten/nederland-ba/nederl...

I don't like having people on banknotes, for the simple reason that one day a French lobby group would decide that Napoleon is a great European who deserves to be on one.

I think the buildings are ugly, and D does its best to obscure them. So that's my winner.

F has very strong "Soviet children's book" vibes.

I wonder why do we need new notes... but I guess running some competition is not a tragedy.

You can see all side-by-side here: https://www.ecb.europa.eu/euro/banknotes/future_banknotes/ht...

My takes:

Designs A and B and I are not terrible, but I'm not impressed.

Design C - the backside looks like the worst soulless corporate landing page graphics (Corporate Memphis style?).

Design D and E, H are okayish. Possibly I'd prefer something along these lines.

Design F has very strange coloring, the watercolor and sketch effect looks nice on screen, but I think more filled and more monochrome notes are more conventional and accepted, also some are bicolor. Not bad, but I'd not like it in everyday use probably.

Design G is somehow not good looking, I cannot phrase it. Both the font, and also the backsides scenes are meh, even the modernist buildings are better on some other series.

Design J : the creepy abstract cartoon people on the backside ruin it. Also somehow not aesthetically pleasing, but not catastrophic.

> I wonder why do we need new notes...

Every redesign introduces new (secret) watermarks, patterns that are hard to copy, so it's also a "tech" update. Eventually more and more of the details become public. By now the current banknotes are too well known and I guess the counterfeits are getting too close.

> Every redesign introduces new (secret) watermarks, patterns that are hard to copy, so it's also a "tech" update. Eventually more and more of the details become public. By now the current banknotes are too well known and I guess the counterfeits are getting too close.

But if I wanted to create counterfeit euro bank notes I could just go with the old ones, no?

Anyway, I think creating new designs just for fun is a good enough reason for me to create new notes.

The old ones get pulled out of circulation and usually stop being accepted at most places, or at least get more scrutiny.

The original euro banknotes were replaced between 2013 and 2019 and are still accepted everywhere you can use the new ones.

Old bank notes are not in circulation forever. They are accounted for by serial numbers. Banks and ATMs can process the serials and designs and report them. Eventually bank notes get pulled out of circulation. So an old bank note is by default suspicious and gets checked more thoroughly. Counterfeiters mostly benefit by blending in with the masses, so having some old note can raise suspicion.

Maybe it is also just fun...

> I wonder why do we need new notes...

An average lifetime of a banknote is 1-2 years for smaller amounts, 2-4 years for bigger ones. It is estimated that 15-25% of all banknotes are replaced every year. From about 30 billion individual banknotes in circulation that makes 4.5B to 7.5B each year.

So why not introduce new designs (and new protections?)

I love H, and I mean it - not only acceptable but even pleasing to me, quite surprising to say. A and B stayed too long in the sun, C indeed is PowerPoint heaven, D is fun but in a circus entry ticket way, E reminds me of a school book and not in the good way, F ouch my eyes too much going on, G okayish but doesn't feel like a banknote but rather... flyers? I - spilled its colors in a watercolor cleaning water way, and finally J is too photo-realistic to look banknote-ish to me.

PS you can even vote for them! https://surveys.ecb.europa.eu/10b/neweuro/

same here, H has class, contrast and is just so pleasing to look at!

Could be that they lack details at this point, but I rate them all from trash to less-trash. Switzerland has had some outstanding bills forever right in the center of Europe, but the EU comes out with this uninspired garbage.

I did not expect anything else.

The proposal J with the birds has some charm, but doesn’t work as a whole.

Announcement release: https://www.ecb.europa.eu/press/pr/date/2026/html/ecb.pr2607...

I kept wondering what all the people and birds were, there's a table on this Motifs page: https://www.ecb.europa.eu/press/pr/date/2025/html/ecb.pr2501...

OK, is there any place where they name the people and the birds? I can recognise the following people:

5 Euro - La Callas

10 Euro - Beethoven

20 Euro - Marie Curie

50 Euro - Cervantes

100 Euro - Da Vinci

200 Euro - ???

I'm sure I know who the 200 Euro person is but I can't name her.

I'm sad I can't recognise any of the birds with any certainty at all. Fortunately their names are listed in Design B. In fact, so are some of their characteristics like size, weight, wingspan etc, so maybe you can use the banknotes to play some kind of bird card game of sorts.

Btw, I'd probably go for Design J; because it's upright and because birds.

The worst part of this whole enterprise is not the designs per se (although the buildings look like soulless buildings from the former USSR but that is besides the point), it is that very few stores actually accept 100/200 euro notes. Even 50 euro notes can be seen as suspicious in certain shops.

So my question is why bother with a redesign when you can't even use the notes in the first place?

F looks incredible, H is also great. They are all pretty good, except for maybe A and E which I find dull. I prefer the birds and buildings, though of the finalists with people on them I find C rather striking. Hopefully whichever wins will look like the original design after being finalized for printing, it would be a shame if they had to dull the colors or rearrange the layout for security features etc

art from Milos Zlatanovic for Serbian notes is still unmatched.

Yeah but would Croatia use notes designed by a Serb?

Never underestimate the pettiness of man.

They should put something like a USB-C connector on the front. Maybe IGP products.

A small reminder of what Europe can do make people's lives easier or better.

IGP? They should put European cheese on it. Fresh notes would have to smell like their picture, by law.

Dad, can I have a Gorgonzola 20?

Best I can do is a Casu Marzu 5.

Decent enough, but quite boring. The nicest notes I know about currently are the Norwegian ones https://www.norges-bank.no/tema/Sedler-og-mynter/gyldige-sed...

But the Canadian ones are physically impressive, they don't really crumble, and seem immune to both liquid and tearing.

I like the Swiss franc banknotes personally

As a point of comparison, how do people feel about the latest issue of Swiss bank notes? I always found Swiss bank note designs quite inspiring.

Ref: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banknotes_of_the_Swiss_franc#N...

Chat Control and age verification belong there.

We don't have it. Some US states have passed those laws already, weirdly enough.

I think buildings or areas may be more useful than people. But, if people are chosen then these should be as least controversial as possible. Compare it to the USA where the orange king wants to brand everything with his old man face. The insanity brand.

I love they don't explain what's in the banknote. Am I suppose to know everything? jeez

https://www.ecb.europa.eu/press/pr/date/2025/html/ecb.pr2501...

They’re called birds. They fly and make weird noises.

One of the designs does! It lists the bird name and a few properties about them like their size and life-expectancy.

https://www.ecb.europa.eu/euro/banknotes/future_banknotes/ht...

The weirdest thing is that all the notes say "The President". Wtf is that?

the bland glass and steel buildings made me think some of these were actually parody.

What's with all the birds? Also I like A the best. It's very modern.

> What's with all the birds?

From the brief:

> “Rivers and birds” highlights the resilience and diversity of Europe’s natural ecosystems by showcasing different stages of rivers and various bird species, emphasising the importance of nature and environmental protection. The European institutions featured on the banknotes remind us of the fundamental values of the European project, which also embraces environmental protection.

https://www.ecb.europa.eu/press/pr/date/2025/html/ecb.pr2501...

Is size not part of "shared identity and values"?

Also, if you like animals, why not use different kinds for easier differentiation rather than stick to birds users will not even know names for?

What do you mean? The various denominations intentionally have different sizes so that blind people can tell them apart by touch. Surely you're not suggesting that they should all be the same size?

While I doubt the benefit of small differences to signal the absolute value (sure, you can feel that one is bigger, but that is it 10 vs 5 bigger or 50 vs 20 bigger?), especially compared to other more helpful direct signs like the raised print, I'm not suggesting eliminating that.

But I'm suggesting varying the desin of both the absolutes (e.g., I'd prefer all of them to be smaller) and the variability (e.g, what about making the most used first 3 notes significantly different length for the easiest differentiation: 1/3, 2/3, 3/3) instead of just playing with some pics.

I'm not trying to start a debate about relevance, but I can't recognize the faces on the 50 and 200 noted. An author and a "nature lover", I guess ?

On the 50 is Miguel de Cervantes (author of Don Quixote). On the 200 is Bertha von Suttner, the first woman to win a Nobel peace prize. I admit I had to look her up.

Oh, funny, I learned about her last week, in a biography of Alfred Nobel, but i only saw pictures of her young.

Proposal E from Myrsini Vardopoulou is absolutely superior.

Definitely birds all the way, with fashionable vertical design.

The ones with EU buildings look like banknotes of the DDR.

It's gonna be E. The birds are nice, but there's no way they do the birds. The other ones with people are too photorealistic or too cartoonish.

I love that design D shows the individual bird's songs, though it isn't integrated in the design very well.

The only reason I can think of for this is a push to a cashless society.

Specially the vertical banknotes, what is up with that?

> Specially the vertical banknotes, what is up with that?

They look awesome. Design I is amazing

Sure, but people hold them and look at them horizontally, elderly people will get super-confused.

Yes, elderly people cannot fathom things that are not horizontal in nature...

Switzerland has been using vertical bank notes for a while and they are amazing in a modern wallet where they are stored folded.

I rated the vertical ones the highest, I think it's genious. It automatically struck me as way more usable. You can see the denomination as you are handing it to someone. It's easier also hold a stack in your hand and count them by flipping the free end, without twisting your hand to read the numbers. Also we are more used to vertical layout in things than we hold in our hands (books, phones, etc.). Definitely a superior design, even if less usual.

That's pretty terrible. I guess only design H looks like it could be real money.

And what are the options they give? I guess historical people with weird abstract community settings or birds with office buildings. Is that all the EU represents?

Whatever they go for I hope they do not open the can of worms that is historical people, or any people for that matter. It will start all kinds of tiresome discussions and people will draw on them making it difficult use defaced bills.

If you really want historical people as a gesture of appreciation or celebration of their achievements then make that a limited edition.

looks cheap. i want my money to look fancy, not like a brochure from an airline.

They all look like something went wrong in the press alignment process

What’s wrong with the existing bank notes? I like their design

A truly horrible design, lacking any finesse or style.

A) Probably my favorite. Despite not loving the overall style, the portraits actually show emotion. Von Suttner's portrait in particular conveys a lot to me.

B) Not a fan. Individual elements are well done but it doesn't feel cohesive to me.

C) Fine/unobjectionable to me.

D) I like these a lot. It feels like they really made the most of the choice of buildings by covering them up with geometric patterns and/or showing the insides.

E) I really hate the backs of these. The back designs of all the others show how the spirit of each historical figure shows up in modern life. This utterly fails to do that for Da Vinci and Curie.

F) These just don't look like banknotes to me, and I don't think the colors look good.

G) Please no.

H) Fronts look good!

I) I'm not sure I like the technology/prey animals on the front.

J) These don't feel like banknotes to me, but I think I might wind up liking them after getting used to them.

What is the exact reason for a redesign (and to spend public money on that topic)? Is it to introduce new anti-counterfeit measures?

Also having people on a note is dumb when the note has to be designed for a continent. Europe is not US it’s a union, but still a collection of sovereign countries with national pride and centuries of history.

Having the EU bureaucrat offices on the notes are cherry on top like could they be more narcissistic?

One could think that they would steal some ideas from Swiss currency note. They could have put things that were invented or discovered in Europe that changed the course of humans forever and something to be proud of being European, instead they went with some birds

> What is the exact reason for a redesign (and to spend public money on that topic)? Is it to introduce new anti-counterfeit measures?

If you want to eliminate corruption, change the color [design] of your banknotes.

"You give us one old one, we give you one new one. Hey! Where'd you get £€$50,000 on your income?

But, no-one will do that.

It’s not like the old notes becomes invalid, they would be in circulation for years to come giving enough time for black money to be converted to new notes

Should let companies advertise on banknotes.

While other countries are cashless

Was hoping for some cookie banners

What happened to the €500?

A palatable version: it's mostly used for laundering/crime, so away with it. Cynical: do we put a man or a woman on it?

Since seemingly nobody has mentioned it yet, I feel compelled to speak out: With all the controversy in this thread about dead artists and scientists, bridges, birds, buildings, and institutions, I for one am just thankful we don't have to suffer some narcissist trying to put his own mug on one of those bills.

I and J are bad fits.

Who is the smug lady?

That’s Beethoven. I know his hair is a bit long, but that’s a man. He does look a bit miffed, but can you blame him? Being deaf when you’re a composer must not have been pleasant.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludwig_van_Beethoven

If you don’t recognise someone else, they are named in the brief.

https://www.ecb.europa.eu/press/pr/date/2025/html/ecb.pr2501...

Also was curious, it is Maria Callas. Opera singer.

The angry one is Ludwig van Beethoven.

I guess of the designs with people I only like designs E and F. There the expressions don't look too odd. Takes some getting used too though.

E without a doubt

Current (bridges connecting) is very nice IMHO. I would change the dimensions maybe (I hate that the bills are taller than wider).

From the proposal I like birds way more - no issue with national associations and "birds cross borders beyond nations".

I like B best

Interestingly some of them have socialist/soviet design but are all bad in their own ways.

- Birds combined with concrete block builds

- dead old people (and grumpy looking in the case of beethoven) combined with concrete blocks

- busy and abstract designs that end up being meaningless

Bland, boring & repetitive designs - what else can one expect from a technocracy.

Where is inspiration and future when europe continues to look back to the glories past?

> Bland, boring & repetitive designs - what else can one expect from a technocracy.

The first two generations of Euro bills, for example. Not bland, not especially boring, not repetitive.

It's funny, it's a mixed bag. Some of the designs are beautiful, and some seem to be inspired by that abstract communist psychological torture cell.

I mean. Put famous Europeans on it. Socrates, Platon, Leonardo, Newton, Leibnitz, Einstein, Hitler....

I don't like the designs.

I didn't even know who the person on the 200€ bill is until today and I have a suspicion she was chosen by some woke EU bureaucrat. I'm sure Europe had better persons in its history.

If Maria Callas is suitable for currency, why not put Daft Punk on it?

As an Austrian, Bertha von Suttner is a big deal. First woman to win a Nobel Peace prize (and probably the reason that prize exists in the first place!), second woman to win a Nobel ever (after Curie). Your ignorance of her is not an indictment of "woke bureaucrats".

Daft Punk honestly sounds cool, but we probably shouldn't be putting any living personalities on there. Feels kinda weird.

> we probably shouldn't be putting any living personalities on there. Feels kinda weird.

Weird and ill-advised. Living people who appear on bank notes tend to be monarchs and dictators. Imagine having someone on the euro notes that suddenly becomes overtly anti-EU. Not a good call to promote someone who’s against you.

Remember when Star Trek mentioned Musk? That did not age well.

https://www.cbr.com/star-trek-discovery-elon-musk-joke-star-...

I'd rather have Henry Kissinger on the note.

Yikes.

Compared to all other figures from European history, she is kind of a random figure.

> I didn't even know who the person on the 200€ bill is until today

Considering she was a pretty big deal, it’s telling that your reaction to learning about someone important you had no knowledge of is to use bland unsubstantiated accusations to insult the person who made the pick instead of “interesting, I should’ve known, I wonder why I haven’t learned about her in school (or have since forgotten), let me deepen my understanding of who this person was and her relevance”.

The fact that this response was first upvoted, then downvoted after the person said they’d rather have Henry Kissinger¹ on the note², I think is quite telling of the kind of people HN is attracting these days.

Well, I guess every website must fall some day.

¹ Which is not only rage bait but also very dumb for a plethora of reasons, the least of which that he wasn’t European.

² And as a reminder, their complaint was calling someone a “woke bureaucrat” because the comment’s author was ignorant of a historical figure. I do wonder if they would have said the same if it had been a man.

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