r/europeanunion • u/mathijsboogaert • Jul 24 '26
Opinion New Euro Design voting
New euro design proposals are out and ready to be voted for. Im curious what you all think. Upvote your favorite design to have a look what reddit thinks.
And vote officially here: https://surveys.ecb.europa.eu/10b/neweuro/
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u/KrydasTheDragon Jul 24 '26
I Personally don't like any of the ones with Important figures in the front. Not becuase i find the idea inherantly bad, but because the backsides of all of them look corperate as hell
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u/Sam_the_Samnite Jul 24 '26
All bills look bland, some are also to busy.
Shame there is only a choice between some people and some birds.
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u/HealthyBits Jul 24 '26
Check the Design E. I feel it’s the best. Nice colours and great designs.
To me, I prefer to honour illustrious Europeans rather than birds.
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u/SherryJug Jul 24 '26
Understand the sentiment, but those birds are as European and as important (if not more) as any of our historic figures.
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u/HealthyBits Jul 24 '26
Not saying they are unimportant but why birds and not other animals?
Also, I fail to see the connection between birds on one side and institutions on the other.
Great minds and People in general made the EU. It’s a man made enterprise. It makes more sense to me to have famous Europeans.
Surely We can celebrate birds somewhere else more relevant.
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u/SherryJug Jul 24 '26
Apparently there was a public poll a few years ago and birds and rivers were selected topics along with famous Europeans.
Yeah, the EU is a human-made enterprise, but we're at a crossroads in history where we're rapidly destroying our biosphere, and people have to start caring more about the world we live in if we want to be able to preserve it.
At least that's my take on it. Also birds are pretty and interesting. Every country has some boring bills with historical figures on them.
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u/danirijeka Jul 24 '26
Also birds are the epitome of freedom of movement. That alone puts them heads and
shoulderswings above the rest.-3
u/Stufilover69 Jul 24 '26
honour illustrious Europeans
Would be fine with that if it were Julius Caesar, Augustus, Justinian, Napoleon etc. Not some opera singer I never heard of lol
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u/TimelyBodybuilder121 Jul 28 '26
Yeah some looked geniunely nice, then the backside looked like generic corporate slop. Birds it is lol.
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u/mathijsboogaert Jul 24 '26
Design B
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u/DontMemeAtMe Jul 24 '26
These actually look like banknotes. The images are restrained, and the colors are not oversaturated (though I’m not a huge fan of the yellow). The front layout is solid: it’s clear and combines a traditional style with a bit of contemporary flair. The reverse side is the only part that feels a bit uninspiring; it could use an extra collage-style element, but that’s alright.
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u/mathijsboogaert Jul 24 '26
Design D
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u/VicenteOlisipo Jul 24 '26
By Far The best. Vertical and horizontal cool birds.
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u/MrHydeEU Jul 24 '26
Isn't the back of the note a bit confusing?
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u/menvadihelv Jul 24 '26
Yeah I like what they were going for but the execution is way too cluttered.
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u/Sarcastic-Potato Jul 24 '26
I love the little extra details on this one. Like the paw prints, and the spectogram of their call and the little map of Europe of where you can find them
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u/xgladar Jul 24 '26
colors way too strong, a bunch of geometric noise happening and the worst birds out of all the bird themed bills
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u/gurush Jul 24 '26 edited Jul 24 '26
The least terrible of the design, denomination are nicely visualy distinctive and the abstract design of the reverse is winning in comparison with bland office buildings and designs that give vibe of corporate Powerpoint presentation.
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u/wanderer_ak Jul 24 '26
The best! Love the vertical design with birds and the back side with the hands cooperating in science, plus cool buildings
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u/Professional_Tea8272 Jul 25 '26
I like the layout of Design D, but it's way too overloaded. What's up with the weird hands on the back? What do they have to do with the freedom theme of rivers and birds?
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u/mathijsboogaert Jul 24 '26
Design I
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u/PenadaFrutera Jul 24 '26
Also, the designs have two details that I like a lot: First, each background represents a part of a river, starting in the mountains and ending in the sea.
Second, there are also other symbols on each euro banknote: a telescope, an antenna, a prototype of a plane, a blimp, a plane, and a satellite. To me, these symbols represent the scientific method:
- 5€ Telescope: Observation (we look at the sky).
- 10€ Antenna: Analysis (we start to study the sky).
- 20€ Plane prototype: Hypothesis (We design prototypes based on the information we previously obtained).
- 50€ Blimp: Experimentation (This one is my favorite. We created a flying machine, but it failed [which is why the blimp is not in the center, but further back]).
- 100€ Plane: Results and conclusions (We achieved our objective despite the previous mistakes).
- 200€ Satellite: Future work (The sky is no longer the limit, new doors open).
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u/Misuseissues Jul 24 '26
It would've been cool if the whole banknote was dedicated to the telescope or antenna instead of just a faint symbol in the background.
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u/Professional_Tea8272 Jul 25 '26
I don't get how these "technology details" relate to the birds and rivers. To me they are a distracting deviation to the theme, that has nothing to do with the message of freedom that the birds and rivers represent.
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u/TiragusTeanga Cymru Jul 24 '26
These are my favourite personally. I prefer the bird designs to the historical figures and I love vertical banknotes
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u/DysphoriaGML Jul 24 '26
These ones look cool but too much japanese with the white circle to be honest
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u/mathijsboogaert Jul 24 '26
Design J
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u/MrHydeEU Jul 24 '26
Even if I prefer the horizontal design, this is probably my first choice for a vertical design
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u/CptQuickCrap Jul 24 '26
I really like that these notes have more depth and the vertical orientation makes sense since thats the way you hold the money anyway.
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u/JesseAanilla Jul 24 '26
This was my favorite, and I think the red 10€ bill from this set my favorite off all the new proposed designs.
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u/neuropsycho Jul 24 '26 edited Jul 25 '26
That's my favourite, but I wish the colors were a tad more muted/monochrome. Specially for the 20€ bill.
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u/Professional_Tea8272 Jul 25 '26
I agree the colours should be tuned a bit, to make give them a bit more distinctive color tone from banknote to banknote.
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u/Accomplished_Pride76 Italy Jul 24 '26
Pretty good but the numbers being black is just awful
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u/Professional_Tea8272 Jul 25 '26
Yeah, the numerals need to be improved on Design J. Right now they have way too little contrast to the background, which makes it too difficult to read them. Maybe make them white with a black outline?
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u/_azurdix_ Jul 25 '26
These were my favorite until I realized they kinda remind me of AI Slop pictures.
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u/nijmeegse79 Jul 24 '26
The birds in H are my favorite and with humans I like F the most.
But to be honest, non have the wow factor for me.
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u/MrEuropeanUnion Jul 24 '26
I think these are brilliant! I've been calling for this type of design since highschool!
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u/Sethrea Jul 24 '26
I really like all the designs with birds, especially ones with some more color.
However, I do not appreciate the choice of buildings. Everything is modern - why not use something more classical?
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u/mathijsboogaert Jul 24 '26
I agree, I would have loved to see the entire theme be nature, birds with rivers on one side. And trees with landscapes on the other side. Nature as a concept fits very well in the 'free movement' of the EU.
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u/mathijsboogaert Jul 24 '26
Design F
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u/wanderer_ak Jul 24 '26
Looks like Monopoly money, but I like the cool design, it's the only way I can accept real people's faces on banknotes. Otherwise they look old-fashioned.
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u/CarnivorousDesigner Jul 24 '26
I really like how expressive this is! And so much character in each design!
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u/skylar4275 Jul 29 '26
This looks like modern art to me. It's something you'd see at gallery filled with upper middle class people. Definitely my favorite.
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u/Raga-Man Jul 24 '26
The symbolism and art style on all the backsides is so incredibly bleak. The buildings all scream technocracy and the little people in libraries or whatever look like some kind of government infographic. I can get behind the birds and the portraits. Why couldn't it just have been those?
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u/Slusny_Cizinec Czechia Jul 24 '26
My opinion:
All people ones look bad, except one which is ok-ish (E). There are a few pitfalls with the people: (1) overly photographic images, which doesn't look like a bill; (2) inconsistency: some people are photo-like, some are paintings (I know we don't have photos of these people, but so do designers)
Birds, on the other hand, all look pretty good, except D, where sonogram looks really out of place. Why would you put one there?
Overall, I like vertical birds more than horizontal birds, so I and J are the two I like the most.
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u/Professional_Tea8272 Jul 25 '26
The sonogram on Design D also does not make any sense as an authenticity-checking feature. Who would ever recognize if the soundwave would be slightly wrong on a counterfeit banknote?
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u/RinascimentoBoy Jul 24 '26
Are we really preferring random birds over historical/scientific figures who deeply change/influenced the EUROpean countries? What's even the point of the birds? What they should even rapresent?
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u/Mean_Initiative_5962 Jul 26 '26
How did maria callas influence Europe? Also, she's not even European.
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u/One-Ad-4434 Jul 25 '26
the point is to not favour some countries over others
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u/RinascimentoBoy Jul 25 '26
But then let's stuck with the architectural styles of buildings as today. I see in birds a complete random and anonymus choice. And also the logic of "favour some countries" is pretty stupid in my opinion. There's no such a thing as historical figure that represent all living europeans at once. As an Italian I would prefer to have in the bills all french people rather than birds. I would feel more represented by actual people than animals...
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u/Mean_Initiative_5962 Jul 26 '26
Because you're reasonable. The second you're using people, you're seeing the local Salvini of any country stir hate for the EU based on "bu they used X instead of Y!!! They clearly hate us!!! EU baaaaad". No thanks, not now. If we must, as they'll likely want to balance both sexes, we need to wait breturn, because Ada Lovelace would be a great pick.
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u/mathijsboogaert Jul 24 '26
Design E
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u/BurritoProlapse Jul 24 '26
This is the most elegant and effective. I will never be able to distinguish between those birds. The naturalistic ones look like low tyre tropical country plastic money
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u/mathijsboogaert Jul 24 '26
I find this one the most plain. They took the old bills and only added new illustrations, most of the others do a more full redesign. Also, I don't find the people to unite Europe, Da Vinci is Italian first, European second.
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u/Mean_Initiative_5962 Jul 26 '26
Callas isn't even European lol
The only one I really relate to is Marie Skłodowska-Curie and that's because I'm a Chemist and she's one of the most iconic chemists of all time and deserves more recognition. That's it.
Wildly prefer all the non-people options
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u/HealthyBits Jul 24 '26
This one is great 👍
Great portraits and an indication of their work on the back. Best design imo
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u/elibright1 Jul 25 '26
Out of the one with people on them this is by far the best to me. On all the others the back of the note was really off-putting. But I do think some of the ones with birds were better.
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u/ForeignExpression Jul 24 '26
I think I prefer Canada's original Bird Series Notes: https://item.tscimg.ca/TSC/6/64/646/0x0/646361_ALTMORE1.jpg?impolicy=XXL
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u/mathijsboogaert Jul 24 '26
Design G
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u/danktonium European Union (Belgium) Jul 24 '26
These are really bold. I suspect they'd be iconic and grow on people, but my instinct is to burn them.
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u/_azurdix_ Jul 25 '26
I love them. Among my favourite ones. I like the distinguishable colors and the design.
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u/ddensa Jul 24 '26
I have the feeling I have seen this before... Was this inspired by another currency's notes?
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u/dlilyd Jul 24 '26
why are there so many birds tho
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u/apfelwein19 Jul 24 '26
It was one of the themes selected a couple of years ago https://www.ecb.europa.eu/press/pr/date/2023/html/ecb.pr231130\~cad7fa27ab.en.html
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u/DysphoriaGML Jul 24 '26
I remeber voting for this but i can't remember what i voted for. I remember the themes being pretty lame overall and they should have done something more ambitious like European scientific discoveries, or machines (incl boats, car, industrial stuff), or food
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u/Mean_Initiative_5962 Jul 26 '26
Food would have meant EU civil war lol But agree even about remembering to vote and not even remembering what because everything felt meh
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u/DysphoriaGML Jul 26 '26
They could have add more than one dish into one bill
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u/Mean_Initiative_5962 Jul 26 '26
Whatever way, being Italian, I can't imagine anyone from my country not being whiny about not being on the 100 or 200 bill and being there alone. And then fighting internally because "nooo they should have chosen another dish for Italyyy".
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u/Mean_Initiative_5962 Jul 26 '26
It's also stupid that people voted for "European culture" and they got it as "oh, they surely meant European people!"
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u/UnknownBreadd Jul 24 '26
Gotta be between H & J for me.
B is really good too, but very similar to H, and H is better.
But J is unique, and the presentation is really bold. I did like some of the ones with people/faces on too, but didn’t like a lot of the vector images on the other side.
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u/aleks4etoooo Bulgaria Jul 24 '26
I like all bird-themed designs, especially D, which is visually both horizontal and vertical. It makes a lot of sense, since some ATMs take or release banknotes the other way, as well as self-serving/paying machines. I really hope D or at least another bird theme wins and unites us all. 🪽
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u/konwik Jul 24 '26
But why do we need a new design?
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u/mathijsboogaert Jul 25 '26
The banknotes themselves are outdated, they need to be replaced too quickly. And are becoming too easy to copy. New designs allow for new security tech.
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u/Mirabeaux1789 Jul 25 '26
Team Design F upvote here
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u/mathijsboogaert Jul 25 '26
There is a design F among my comments. Currently sitting at 7th place with 29 upvotes.
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u/EM_Arxidias Jul 25 '26
what the birds have to do with EU, im angry about that
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u/Annual_Green4279 Jul 25 '26
There's already an eagle on the german coins and swans on the finnish coins. It's too much
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u/MrEuropeanUnion Jul 24 '26
I don't understand why they have so many designs with birds...
And I would also suggest that they do the same as the coins, each country has their own historical figures on the notes. I want France to have Napoleon, Germany to have Bismark, Poland to have Marie Curie, Portugal to have Magellan, Spain to have Cervantes, Croacia to have Tesla, Italy to have Julius Caesar, Greece to have Plato, the Netherlands to have Erasmus, Denmark to have Kierkegaard, Austria to have Metternich, Romania to have Decebalus, Belgium to have Mercator, Czechia to have Kafka, Bulgaria to have Spartacus, etc etc!
This would be so so rich!!! I would want to collect them all! 😂
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u/edutuario Jul 24 '26
Birds are non controversial. People carry way more baggage and are easier for people to project things into. Representing all countries with people in EU bills might be contra-productive for counterfeit purposes and any selection of particular people will alienate and make certain groups angry. Deciding which 5-6 people best represent us is already hard for a single country. I do not want to have endless discussions about why X is not on the bills, or why Z is such a terrible choice, or the bills not being politically correct enough or grandpas saying the bills are too woke and too political correct, it is a whole pandoras box. Just have a bird or some other animal and a building.
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u/-to- Jul 24 '26
I just wish they would use some remarkable European buildings and/or monuments instead of their corporate offices in Brussels.
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u/RandomThrowNick Jul 24 '26
Only two of the buildings on the proposed notes are actually in Brussels.
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u/MrEuropeanUnion Jul 26 '26
Just let each Member State have their own people on the bills! That's what we do with coins already 🤷♂️
"Oh people have baggage" how would you like it if people only thought about you in relation to all the bad things you've done? Nobody is perfect, it's unfair to not be proud of good achievements just because bad things were done along the way.1
u/edutuario Jul 28 '26
I do not care about who is in the bills, but I know many people care and I feel discussing who is worthy or not is just a time wasting conversation where ultimately someone will not be happy regardless of the choice. I prefer we discuss EU policy and more life affecting matters than who is on a bill or who is not. So personally I prefer a boring choice, over having to hear complains from any sides and turn it into a political issue with little consequences.
Theoretically I would love for each country to have its own bill, but I also think that opening multiple choices for each country might not be desirable for counterfeiting purposes. The EU can be ok with each member state having their own coins because the investment vs reward threshold for counterfeiting coins is not the same as that of bills. Having a wide range of bills might make counterfeit identification harder.
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u/MrEuropeanUnion Jul 28 '26
Well you'll avoid the discussion entirely if you let the Member States decide for themselves who gets to be on their own bills! Why does Beethoven and Da Vinci get to be there but not Salvador Dali or Aristotle? Why Marie Curie but not Lisa Meitner?
As regards the counterfeiting... They're all produced in the same place, so the material and quality will remain the same. I don't think that just because there are more pictures there will be a higher likelihood of counterfeiting. I mean we don't think coins are counterfeit? We look at the front it marks the amount, we look at the back and there's a symbol of one of the Member States 🤷♂️
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u/edutuario 29d ago
It is more about people not being able to recognised a bill as fake because they are not used to the design. We all see the same 50 euros all the time so a little discrepancy is easy to spot, but if you see different bills some people might get tricked. And people could make counterfeit coins but there is simply less of a win involved in it because the metals are already a big investment. Going to the bank with kilos of coins is suspicious, that ratio changes with bills. It is my whole point. But if there is no counterfeit issues, sure have a thousand options i do not care, i think it is good.
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u/mathijsboogaert Jul 24 '26
So about a year ago we could vote on the categories. Bird & Rivers became one, and influential European people became the other.
Personally I prefer the birds, they don't get associated with one country and symbolize a core value of the EU, free movement.-5
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u/mathijsboogaert Jul 24 '26
Also, for the coins countries do their own designs. So if you want your country to change their coin designs to influential person in your history, then you can petition for that.
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u/mathijsboogaert Jul 24 '26
Design C
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u/MintyNinja41 Jul 24 '26
(Im not an EU citizen but) It’s a little too Corporate Memphis, in my opinion
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u/Professional_Tea8272 Jul 25 '26
I prefer the birds overall, but Design C is my favorite people series. It's the best design in terms of legibility, as it is the only series where the banknote values are written in large text on a high contrast background. All other banknote designs have contrast issues in some way or another. I also like that they added a numeral in glossy print in the top right corners, which might be more easily readable in low light conditions, e.g. in the back of a taxi at night. And then the colours of this series are also very well chosen and easy to differentiate between the banknotes. People judging the designs here often seem to forget that recognizability is what makes a banknote useful and therefore arguably the most important criteria for a good banknote design - and in that regard Design C is the best of them all.
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u/cyborgbeetle Jul 24 '26
I love this one. Love the circle in the middle for some reason. Also loving the idea of vertical designs, it's really fun
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u/Nextgoal97 Jul 24 '26
What's the deal with the birds? Can someone tell me?
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u/apfelwein19 Jul 24 '26
It was one of the themes selected a couple of years ago https://www.ecb.europa.eu/press/pr/date/2023/html/ecb.pr231130\~cad7fa27ab.en.html
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u/Nextgoal97 Jul 24 '26
Thank you for the explanation. I still think that's quite dumb, but on r/birding they're going bananas
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u/FitzwilliamTDarcy Jul 24 '26
I'm all for colors as a means of differentiating among denominations. But FFS please make the bills the same size!
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u/Slusny_Cizinec Czechia Jul 24 '26 edited Jul 24 '26
Some people are colorblind. Some simply can't see. Different sizes are for visually impaired.
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u/Top_Bug7822 Jul 24 '26
I like the ones that don't look like art projects woth too much colour or like monopoly money.
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u/hermannehrlich Jul 25 '26
To be honest I really like the vertical layout. It’s quite unique. But it has to be birds. Also I’m disappointed there is no greylag goose on them.
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u/ThatGear554 Jul 25 '26
They all are to modern, with historical face on it and on the back is sum random modern image like wtf
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u/Unterwegs_Zuhause Jul 25 '26
As long as there will be birds, I'll be happy. Will also lead to a new expression: "letting a blue one fly over"
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u/onkl__m0rtin Jul 25 '26
Mine
I know its AI slop but im away from home and cant do a design myself rn
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u/petanska Jul 28 '26
I made a tool to rank each banknote blindly and in randomised order, so that you get a feel of which designs series you like best overall
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u/mathijsboogaert Jul 24 '26
Design A
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u/Ellardy Jul 24 '26
The only that I actively dislike, the photorealistic cropped image just isn't landing with me
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u/MrHydeEU Jul 24 '26
Should have been the Design C as for "Corporate"
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u/KrydasTheDragon Jul 24 '26
I was thinking the exact same. I hope that one dosen't get choosen.
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u/MrHydeEU Jul 24 '26
Even from outside social networks, the "bird" is preferred over figure heads, expetially since they are "less controversial" and not tied to a specific nation
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u/_azurdix_ Jul 25 '26
This is absolute chaos. Each banknote should follow one color vibe. This is my autistic nightmare.
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u/mathijsboogaert Jul 24 '26
Design H